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SPEECHES 



THOMAS CORWIN, 



WITH A SKETCH OF HIS LIFE. 



EDITED BY ISAAC STROHM. 



DAYTOX, OHIO: 

WM. F. COMLY & CO., PUBLISHERS. 
1859. 



ETS'dT 



• <5 






Entered, according; to Act of Congress, in the year 1859, 

By JOHN P. COMLY, 

In the Clerk's office of the District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. 

STtREOTYPED AT THE FRANKLIN FOUNOERV, CINCINNATI, 0, 



3S 



?6 

ADVERTISEMEJSTT. 



The frequent application for copies of one or more 
of Mr. Corwin's speeches, and the wish often ex- 
pressed that all his reported speeches could be 
obtained in a single volume, induced the publishers 
to collect and j^rint them in their present form. 
Beginning with Mr. Corwin's first effort in the Legis- 
lature of Ohio in 1822, and continuing through the 
period of his services in both Houses of Congress, 
this volume contains every speech delivered by him 
of which a record has been made. To these we 
have added the only one of his addresses to a public 
society that has found its way to the printing-office, 
and so has been preserved. 

Mr. Corwin, we believe, has never written out a 
single one of his political speeches before its delivery, 
and no appeals from his friends, however strongly 
made, have thus far induced him to j^repare any 
for the press, after the people had heard them 
from his own lips. Perhaps no more welcome addi- 
tion could be made to the libraries of the scholar, 
the politician, and the masses of the people, than the 
book which we now oifer to the public. 

The Publishers. 
(iii) 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

MEMOIR, 7 

SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF OHIO, 

AGAINST CORPORAL PUNISHMENT, 51 

MASONIC ORATION, DELIVERED AT HAMILTON, OHIO, 68 

SPEECH IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, UNITED 

STATES, ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS, , 94 

REMARKS ON PRESENTING MEMORIALS UPON TPIE SAME SUB- 
JECT, leo 

REMARKS ON THE CONSTITUTION OF MICHIGAN, 165 

SPEECH ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE, 173 

SPEECH ON THE CUMBERLAND ROAD BILL, 217 

REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY, 253 

INAUGURAL ADDRESS, AS GOVERNOR OF OHIO 282 

REMARKS IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, ON THE ARMY 
BILL, IN FAVOR OF GRANTING BOUNTY LANDS TO SOL- 
DIERS IN THE MEXICAN WAR, 306 

SPEECH ON THE MEXICAN WAR,....- 326 

INCIDENTAL REMARKS ON THE •' THREE MILLION BILL," 389 

REMARKS ON THE TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT OF OREGON,.. 393 

SPEECH ON THE CLAYTON COMPROMISE BILL, 404 

DEFENSE OF JUDGE McLEAN, 462 

REMARKS ON THE ACTION OF OHIO, IN REGARD TO FUGI- 
TIVES FROM LABOR, 471 

ON THE BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF Wii. DARBY, 474 

SPEECH AT IRONTON, ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES, 477 

(V) 



MEMOIR 



THOMAS CORWIN, 



If we were to judge from the apparent facility with 
which modern biographies are written, it would seem to 
be the easiest thing imaginable to make a hero, and to 
surround his deeds, trivial though they may, in reality, 
be, with all the charms of romance. Incidents the most 
common-place are made to appear striking in magnitude 
and importance ; and not a circumstance in the life of 
the individual whose acts are thus to be registered, but 
assumes a character and importance truly astonishing 

The writer of this has little ability, and still less 
inclination, to indulge in such an inflated, or rather 
inflamed style of portraiture, nor does the subject of 
the present sketch need it; and in preparing a memoir 
of the distinguished man — a collection of whose speeches 
is now offered, in a convenient form, to the public — 
he simply desires to present such facts as will, in some 
degree, gratify the curiosity natural to the reader. 

To note these, in the history of a living statesman, is, 
when properly considered, an oflice of some delicacy. 
But, however averse the writer may be to studied lauda- 
tion, he will nevertheless not withhold anything true 
and deserved because it may appear eulogistic. The 

(7) 



8 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

limits wliicli he has prescribed to himself compel him 
to be brief; and he will leave to a later period, and for 
abler pens, the grateful labor of a more extended biogra- 
phy of Thomas Corwin. 

The Corwiu family originally immigrated to the 
American colonies from Hungary, and, it is said, are 
traceable to the celebrated Matthias Corvinus of that 
country. Several branches of the family subsequently 
settled in Kentucky, where, in the county of Bourbon, 
on the 29th day of July, 1794, the subject of this Memoir 
was born. 

In the autumn of 1798, his father, Matthias Corwin, 
removed to what is now Warren county, Ohio, and set- 
tled on a small farm near the present site of Lebanon, 
in that county. He served for many years in the Ohio 
Legislature, after that portion of the North-western Ter- 
ritory became a State — a part of the time presiding as 
Speaker of the House, distinguished for the dignity and 
impartiality with which he discharged the duties of that 
office. His name, in that capacity, is still to be found 
attached to many statutes yet in force. He was one of 
the associate judges of the Court of Common Pleas for 
AVarren county, an office which he held at the period 
of his death, in 1829. No man was more esteemed in 
the community in which he lived than Judge Corwin. 
He was one of the most respectable and honored men 
in the State, in his day, and is remembered by his 
neighbors as a faithful member of the Baptist Church, 
and as a public officer of unimpeachable integrity. 

Thomas Corwin's early education was obtained under 
such limited advantages as were common in a newly- 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 9 

settled countr}'. " The first scbool he entered," we find, 
in an article published in 1840 by his schoolmate and 
kinsman,* "was in the fall of 1798. It was a low, 
rough log-cabin, put up in a few hours by the neighbors 
who formed the little settlement, and stood on the north 
bank of Turtle creek, about half a mile west of the place 
where the town of Lebanon now stands." That school 
was then, and only for a short time, taught by the late 
Judge Dunlevy. ISTothing like a regular and "continuous 
school existed in that vicinity until the year 1806, when 
the Rev. J. Grigg commenced one under more favorable 
prospects in Lebanon, that town having then been laid 
out about three years, and numbering some forty or fift\' 
families. During the two years Mr, Grigg continued his 
school, Thomas could only attend through the winter 
months, his services being required at home during the 
busy farming seasons. "It was here, however," continues 
his kinsman, "that Thomas completed most of his college 
education." An elder brother, Matthias, had been desig- 
nated by their father for one of the learned professions, 
and was supplied with a good collection of books for his 
preparatory studies. Thomas availed himself of these, 
and made such use of them durins; his leisure hours as 
profited him vastly in his self-education in maturer years. 
In the autumn of 1812, a sudden call was made for 
troops to join the army on the northern frontier, in the 
war then pending with Great Britain. It was just after 
the disgraceful capitulation of General Hull ; and in the 
derangement of the plans of the "War Department which 
it occasioned, the supplies of provisions for the American 

*A. H. Dunlevy, Esq, 



10 ' MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

soldiers fell short. Here was a demand on the patriotism 
of the citizens of a then sparsely inhabited country, and 
it required prompt action on their part to furnish the 
necessary sustenance upon so sudden an emergency. The 
elder Mr. Corwin, in view of this pressing public need, 
determined to send his team to aid in the benevolent 
work of supplying food to the suffering army, and 
Thomas, then a lad of seventeen, volunteered to be 
teamster. 

Returning from the frontier, Thomas continued to 
labor, as he had previously done, upon his father's farm, 
until some time in the year following, when he received, 
while driving the team, an injury upon his knee, which 
rendered him incapable of pursuing active physical labor. 
During the tedious months through which he was com- 
pelled to nurse this wound, he again had recourse to his 
brother's books, to which "he betook himself with in- 
tense application, and" (to quote again from the article 
to which we have referred) " before the crack of his 
wagon-whip, and his shrill voice at the plough, had died 
away in the ears of his neighbors, 

' He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one.' " 

Soon after this he entered the office of the Clerk of 
the Common Pleas Court, then in charge of his brother 
Matthias; and, in the year 1816, he commenced the study 
of law under Joshua Collett, Esq., who was afterwards 
successively president of that judicial circuit, and one of 
the judges of the Supreme Court of the State. Mr. 
CoRWiN was admitted to the bar in 1817. He at once 
took a commanding position as an advocate in the courts 
which he attended, and was looked upon as a leading 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 11 

spirit by his brethren of the legal profession. Of his 
achievements in this as well as in every other sphere in 
which his talents were called into active play, the writer 
may have further occasion to speak. 

Mr. Corwin's career as a public man began in 1822, 
in which year he was first elected a member of the lower 
branch of the General Assembly of Ohio. In this body 
he served for a short period only; but his course, as a 
representative, "was characterized," observes a writer in 
the American Bevieio, "by the marks of independence, 
uprightness, and eloquence which have given him so 
much distinction since." 

On retiring from the legislature, for an interval of 
several years Mr. Corwin devoted himself assiduously to 
the practice of his profession, which had then become 
extensive and profitable, and was retained long after his 
public duties, to which, as will be seen, he was subse- 
quently called, engrossed so much of his time and atten- 
tion. In 1829, he was again returned to the Legislature 
of Ohio, under circumstances much to his credit as a 
man worthy of public confidence. In that year, for the 
first time in the history of the elections in "Warren 
coimty, an attempt was made to choose members of the 
General Assembly as mere partisans, and a "Jackson" 
ticket was nominated. But the idea, among the staid 
yeomanry of that district, in those days, of selecting 
legislators merely because they were the adherents of 
this or that man for the Presidency, so outraged the 
people's sense of propriety, that, without regard to the 
divisions in sentiment which had theretofore existed, they 
determined to rebuke that attempt. Mr. Corwin (much 
against his inclination) and Ex-governor Morrow, con- 



12 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

sented to be the candidates of tlie people, and were 
elected. by decided majorities. 

In 1830, he was first returned to the Congress of the 
United States. Although before that time he had been 
earnestly solicited to be a candidate, he had always 
declined, from term to term, in favor of others for whose 
hopes and aspirations he entertained a tender regard. 
The district was then composed of Warren and Butler, 
and contained, as was shown at previous elections, a 
decided majority in favor of General Jackson, to whose 
elevation to the Presidency Mr. Corwin had always been 
opposed. But such was the personal popularity and 
admitted merit of Mr. Corwin, that he was enabled to 
overcome this partisan opposition, and he was elected 
by a large vote. He was re-elected to each successive 
Congress until 1840, when, in consequence of his nomina- 
tion for Governor, at the great mass-convention held at 
Columbus, on the 22d February of that memorable year, 
he resigned his seat, to take eftect in May following. 

During the campaign of 1840, he became extensively 
known as an effective public speaker, and to his efforts, 
perhaps, more than to those of any other man in the 
Union, the unexampled majority of General Harrison, in 
November of that year, may be attributed. His majority 
for Governor was so much greater than was ever before 
attained by a successful candidate in a strenuously con- 
tested canvass, that it proved a sure precursor of a still 
larger one for the veteran of Tippecanoe. 

Mr. Corwin served but one term as Governor, his 
former competitor, through a diversion in favor of an 
ultra anti-slavery candidate, having led him, in the con- 
test of 1842, by a plurality of some five thousand votes. 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 13 

In 1844, he was placed at the head of the Clay elec- 
toral ticket, in Ohio. Soon after the meeting_ of the 
State Legislature in that year, he was elected United 
States Senator by that assembly, both branches of which 
were then, for the first time in a series of years, com- 
posed of a majority of opponents to the Democratic 
party. Mr. Corwin took his seat in that highest legisla- 
tive council in the world, upon the accession of Mr. Polk 
to the Presidential chair, in 1845, and served until July 
22d, 1850, when, at the invitation of President Fillmore, 
he entered upon the duties of Secretary of the Treasury. 
After the expiration of that administration, in 1853, and 
until the fall of 1858, he attended to his professional 
duties in his law office in Cincinnati, maintaining his 
residence permanently in Lebanon, among his old neigh- 
bors, comparatively aloof from the political questions of 
the day. But men like Mr. Corwin are never uncon- 
cerned about the workings of our political system, nor 
uninformed as to the various phases which such topics as 
interest the people are constantly assuming. Assenting 
to pressing solicitations from various quarters, and under 
a deep sense of a citizen's obligations to his country 
while he has any hopes of being useful, he permitted 
himself to be a candidate for a seat in the Thirty-sixth 
Congress, as a representative from his old Warren county 
district, and was, of course, triumphantly elected. 

Mr. Corwin, as will be perceived in the preceding 
summary of the principal dates and events of his history, 
without the advantages of what is called a liberal educa- 
tion, has attained a degree of eminence which it is the 
fortune of few men to reach without adventitious aid. 



14 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

Modest and unassuming men rarely make mucli advance- 
ment in the road to fame, unless, as in his case, the fire 
of true genius, and the possession of real merit and 
worth, are unmistakeably evident. These in him were 
observable at an early period of his life. At the age 
of fourteen, his "latent talent for efiective orator}-, by 
action, emphasis, and gesture," was exhibited in the part 
he took in the school exercises of his time. Though to 
this happy faculty of ready eloquence is doubtless to be 
attributed his rapid strides to distinction as an advocate 
at the bar, "he was even more distinguished," writes his 
friend, "for his keenness of discrimination. This always 
prevented him from using any authority not strictly in 
point, or any item of evidence that could be turned 
against him." This discrimination, rather than his 
eloquence, some think, was his forte, though the latter, 
on occasions when he would be excited in the progress 
of a trial, "was, perhaps, unequalled, in his day, at the 
bar of Ohio." 

Mr. CoRWiN exhibits, when addressing a jury, all that 
opulence of legal and miscellaneous information and 
philosophic reflection which are the result of a life of 
application to books, and close study of human nature. 
No one can more readily or more delicately sweep every 
chord by which the sympathies of the heart can be 
touched, or find a more direct avenue to whatever feel- 
ing, passion, sentiment, or prejudice it may be necessary 
to reach to obtain consent to his reasoning. The infinite 
humor playing in his countenance, and ever anticipating 
the utterances of his eloquent tongue, but adds to his 
power to overwhelm with ridicule any unfortunate posi- 
tion taken by an opponent; and, though this sometimes 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 15 

18 calculated to divert the auditor from the more pon- 
derous logic he uses, it carries with it, nevertheless, an 
undercurrent of sound argument, which does not fail to 
convince. All his varied acquirements he uses whenever 
it may be desirable to give strong probability to a merely 
possible fact; and he brings up the known to prove the 
unknown by a masterly comparative course of illustration. 
During his brief career in the Legislature of Ohio, 
Mr. CoRAViN distinguished himself by his opposition to 
the passage of a bill proposing to resort to public whip- 
ping as a punishment for petty larceny. A law inflicting 
such a penalty for like offences had been in force, for a 
few years, in Ohio, at the beginning of her State g:ov- 
ernment, but it was repealed. The increase of such 
misdemeanors, in a portion of the State, had induced 
the attempt, on the part of some of the members, to 
procure its re-enactment. It was contended, by those in 
favor of this code, that for the crime of theft no pun- 
ishment was so appropriate; whipping seemed to them 
something inseparable from stealing — it was the obvious 
penalty due to the offence. The tax upon the people of 
some of the counties, for maintaining the culprits in 
prison for such periods as the laws prescribed for minor 
offences, had, from their frequent commission, become 
burdensome ; and the disgrace attached to the penalty 
which it was proposed to revive, it was argued, would 
prove to be a more economical as well as a more effica- 
cious remedy. Mr. Corwin's remarks upon this question 
show not only the repugnance to such means for correct- 
ing evil entertained by a person of refined sensibilities, 
but also a profound knowledge of the objects and prin- 
ciples of law, as well as an intimate acquaintance with 



16 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the motives of human action. The bill was ultimately 
defeated. 

As a representative in the popular branch of the 
National Legislature, Mr. Corwin was industrious, and 
faithful to the trust reposed in him by his constituents; 
and his course "was that of a careful, thoughtful, con- 
scientious man. His appearance in debate was rare, but 
always eflective. The announcement of his name was 
an assurance of profound stillness in the House. That 
stillness continued while he occupied the floor, except as 
it was sometimes broken by demonstrations of excite- 
ment, such as wit, argument, and eloquence like his 
must occasionally produce." * Though our National 
Legislative literature is by no means meagre, farther 
contributions from Mr. Corwin would have been a most 
welcome relief to the folios of heavy essays, written and 
plodded over, with anxious care, for days and weeks, by 
members at their private apartments, to - be " read " in 
committee, to few listeners, at the first convenient oppor- 
tunity. His remarks on the Surplus Revenue, criticising 
the report of Mr. Cambreling, is a masterly effort, deliv- 
ered without time for preparation, and upon the sugges- 
tions of the moment. His well-remembered reply to 
General Crary is another of those happy impromptu 
speeches; and is unapproachable for overwhelming sar- 
casm and ridicule, and its abounding good humor. This 
speech was delivered in committee of the Whole on the 
Cumberland Road bill, on the 15th of February, 1840. 
At the next sitting of the House (Monday, the 17th), 
Mr. Corwin again spoke — this time to the question 

.* American Review. 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 17 

before the House — and entered into the congtitutionality 
of Internal Improvements by the General Government. 
The reporters failed to write out his remarks, expecting 
him to prepare his speech for publication from their 
notes, and alleging that they could not do him justice — 
so fully were they impressed with the able manner in 
which he had treated the subject. This, however, it was 
not convenient for Mr. Corwin to do, from the multi- 
plicity of duties and engagements then demanding his 
attention ; and hence one of the best of his congressional 
speeches has never been given to the public. 

When canvassing the State as a candidate for Gov- 
ernor, in 1840, Mr. Corwin's power to sway the masses 
as a popular orator became widely known. " The 
Wagoner Boy," as he was familiarly named, from the 
circumstance of his driving his father's team with pro- 
visions for the army, proved a rallying word of that 
campaign. A gentleman,* who had been spoken of for 
the nomination at the same time, thus addressed the 
thousands assembled at Columbus on that occasion, when 
Mr. Corwin's name was announced as the candidate 
selected : 

" When the brave Harrison and his gallant army were 
" exposed to the dangers and hardships of the north- 
" western frontier — separated from the interior, on which 
" they were dependent for their supplies, by the brush- 
" wood and swamps of the St. Mary's country, through 
" which there was no road — where each wagoner had to 
" make his way wherever he could find a passable place, 
"leaving traces and routes, which are still visible for a 

* General C. Anthony. 



18 MEMOIR or THOMAS CORWIN. 

" space of several dajs' journey in length — there was one 
" team which was managed bv a little, dark-complexioned, 
"hardy-looking lad, apparently about fifteen or sixteen 
"years old, who was familiarly called Tom Corwes'. 
" Through all of that service he proved himself a good 
" ' whip ' and an excellent ' reinsman.' And in the situa- 
"tion in which we are about to place him, he will be 
"found equally skillful." 

This was received with great enthusiasm. There was 
a happy coincidence in the object accomplished by the 
wagoner candidate for Governor, and the achievements 
of the militarv candidate for President. It was to succor 
the army under the command of the latter, that the 
former performed his humble though honorable mission. 
There was much in it to touch the sympathies of a 
grateful people ; and it is not surprising that the popular 
heart should have responded in song, as it did, during 
that exciting campaign. 

Among the spontaneous effusions of that contest, is a 
tribute to Mr. CoRwm, published in the Dayton "Log- 
cabin," and adapted to a popular air, by his friend and 
admirer, the late John W. Van Cleve, of Dayton — a 
gentleman of fine talents and varied accomplishments. 
Though somewhat foreign to the purpose of this sketch, 
the first two stanzas may be given as a reflex of the 
sincere regard felt for Mr. Corwin by his early acquaint- 
ances and friends: 

"Success to you, Tom Corwin! 

Tom Corwin, our true hearts love you I 
Ohio has no nobler son, 
In worth there's none above you; 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 19 

And she will soon bestow 

On you her highest honor, 
And then our State will proudly show 

Without a stain upon her. 

"Success to you, Tom Corwin! 

We 've seen, with warm emotion, 
Tour faithfulness to Freedom's cause, 

Your boldness, your devotion; 
And we will ne'er forget 

That you our rights have guarded; 
Our grateful hearts shall pay the debt, 

And worth shall be rewarded." 

The office of Governor of Ohio, though a position of 
dignity, did not afford much scope, limited as were its 
duties and patronage under the constitution then exist- 
ing, to exhibit the talents for which Mr. Corwin is most 
remarkable. He is himself reported to have facetiously- 
remarked, that the principal duties of the place were 
" to appoint notaries public and pardon convicts in the 
penitentiary." It may be observed, however, that, in the 
exercise of the latter prerogative, he acted in accordance 
with that humane reformatory spirit for which he has 
always been noted. As in his capacity of legislator he 
had been decidedly opposed to the degradation of the 
whipping-post, so, as Governor, he did his utmost, con- 
sistently with the purposes of justice, to remove from the 
punishment in the State prison the stigma of its disfran- 
chisement; and he made it a subject of special inquiry 
to ascertain the habits and deportment of a prisoner 
during his confinement. Whenever these evinced a 
degree of reformation, and a desire to lead a better life, 
Governor Corwin would sign his pardon, to take effect a 



2,0 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

day or two before the expiration of the term for which 
he was sentenced ; thus restoring the released convict to 
all the franchises which he had previously possessed. 
This course, laudable as it Avas, subjected him to the 
animadversion of political opponents, who, without ap- 
pearing to appreciate the motive, represented it as an 
attempt to thwart the administration of justice ; and was 
used, among other things, to his prejudice in the contest 
of 1842, when, as has already been stated, he failed to 
be re-elected. 

In his inaugural address, delivered before the Legis- 
lature on the 16th December, 1840, speaking in relation 
to the division of legislative power, under the Constitu- 
tion, between the General Government and the States, 
he remarks : 

" On all subjects of this character, prudence and 
"patriotism alike demand that both parties should for^ 
" bear, if possible, to enter the field of conflict in pursuit 
" of a questionable claim of jurisdiction. That spirit of 
" concession, so powerfully operative in the formation of 
"the Federal Constitution, should always be invoked by 
"those whose duty it may be, either as oflicers of the 
"General or State authorities, to fix its true interpreta- 
"tion. When we regard, however, the invariable ten- 
"dency of power to reach after still further and more 
"extended dominion, and when we consider the obvious 
" advantage which the National Government enjoys ib a 
" conflict with a single State of the Union, arising from 
"its grej\ter wealth and patronage, and by consequence 
"its superior influence over public opinion, it becomes 
"the obvious duty of the State Legislatures to watch 
"with vigilance, and, on all questions not within the 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 21 

"province of the judiciary, to assert, in a peaceful yet 
"reso'ute tone, the claims and powers of the weaker 
" party." 

Governor Corwin's annual messages to the General 
Assembly may be regarded as model documents of the 
kind. Such matter as he deemed it essential to treat 
upon, is presented in a clear and perspicuous style ; and 
he never lengthened his remarks to the extent to which 
many similar State papers are too often elongated. They 
are principally confined to matters pertinent to State 
legislation, and do not argue national politics; though, 
incidentally, the policy of the General Government is 
courteously and freely commented upon. The following 
extract from his first annual communication to the Legis- 
lature, exhibits the deep interest he has always felt in the 
cause of moral and intellectual improvement, as well as 
his just appreciation of what constitutes good govern- 
ment. Seldom do we find in executive messages a pas- 
sage combining so much truth and sound doctrine, and 
so happily expressed: 

"It is in times of profound tranquility, when the 
"people are undisturbed by the tumults of war, that the 
" duties of enlightened patriotism invite us to the grate- 
"ful task of giving depth and permanency to our free 
"institutions. It is only at such periods that a common- 
" wealth can hope to deliberate calmly and successfully 
" upon systems of policy, calculated to stimulate industry, 
"by giving it legal assurance that it shall be protected 
"in the enjoyment of its acquisitions; to strengthen 
"general morality by laws which shall tend to suppress 
"vice and crime in all their forms; to give energy and 
"independence of character to all classes by measures 



22 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

"which will promote, as far as practicable, equality of 
" condition, and thus establish rational liberty for our- 
" selves, and give hope of its countenance for ages to 
" come. 

" Of measures which contribute to these ends, edu- 
" cation, comprehending moral as well as intellectual 
"instruction, is of the first importance. Under a con- 
" stitution like ours, which imparts to every citizen the 
" same civil rights, education must remain a subject of 
" vital interest in reference to the general welfare of the 
" State. If we are to trust the lessons of history, we are 
"brought to the conclusion that government is, and 
"always has been, the most efficient of all the causes 
" which operate in forming the character and shaping 
"the destinies of nations. Where the right of suffrage 
"is so unrestricted as with us, government is necessarily 
"the offspring of all the people, and will reflect the 
"moral and intellectual features of its parent with un- 
" varying fidelity. 

" If the operations of the most profound thinkers had 
" left us in doubt upon this interesting subject, the familiar 
" history of the last century alone has furnished numerous 
" and melancholy proofs, that no people, to whom moral 
" and intellectual culture have been denied, are capable 
" of achieving or enjoying the blessings of rational liberty, 
" founded upon any system which tolerates popular 
" agency in the conduct of public affairs. So profoundly 
" impressed with this great truth were the framers of our 
" constitution, that they did not leave it to the judgments 
"of the future to decide. They did not allow the subject 
" of education to remain in that class which might be, in 
"after times, adopted or rejected upon the doubtful test 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 23 

" of expediency. They incorporated it into tLe Constitu- 
"tion. In the 3d section of the 8th article of the Con- 
"stitution, it is expressly declared, that 'religion, morality 
" and knowledge being essentially necessary to good gov- 
" ernment and the happiness of mankind, schools and the 
" means of instruction shall forever he encouraged by legis- 
" lative provisio7i, not inconsistent with the rights of 
"conscience.' In the schools, the encouragement of 
"which is thus enjoined as a proper subject of legislative 
"provision, it is apparent that the makers of the Consti- 
"tution intended to combine moral with intellectual 
"instruction. All experience and observation of man's 
"nature have shown that merely intellectual improve- 
" meftt is but a small advance in the accomplishment of 
" a proper civilization. Without morals, civilization only 
" displays energy, and that the more fearful in its powers 
" and purposes, as it wants the restraining and softening 
" influences which alone give it a direction to objects of 
" utility or benevolence." 

At the Whig State convention, held at Columbus, O., 
in January, 1844, over which Mr. Corwin presided, he 
was tendered a unanimous nomination, and urgently 
solicited to permit the use of his name a third time as 
a candidate for Governor. This he declined, in a speech 
which will be remembered during the lifetime of many 
of those who were present on that occasion. It was one 
of those grand efforts which leave their impress upon 
the auditor, but which, like too many others from the 
same gifted orator, was not reported and preserved. At 
a subsequent stage of the proceedings of this convention, 
the late venerable Ex-governor, Jeremiah Morrow, who 
was present as a delegate, submitted the following sig- 



24 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN, 

nificant and complimentary resolution, which was adopted 
with a vociferous acclaim from the assembled masses : 

^' Hcsolvcd, That in Thomas Corwin we recognize a 
" patriot, a statesman, an orator, a man of the people, 
" and a champion of their rights — a man whom Ohio is 
"proud to call her own. We esteem him, and we love 
"him." 

" This resolution," (we quote from the published pro- 
ceedings,) " and the enthusiastic call of the vast multitude 
" which surrounded him, again brought forth a response 
"from Governor Corwin, who, for an hour and a half, 
" enchained his audience in breathless attention, or called 
"from them deafening shouts of applause. [Who is 
" there of this convention that will not carry with* him 
"to the grave a vivid recollection of the noble, manly, 
"and patriotic sentiments that were uttered by him on 
"this occasion, and of the scorching sarcasm with which 
"he overwhelmed the pretended friends of the people, 
"who, in the name of democracy, were attempting to 
"subvert our free institutions?"] 

This convention, as the reader has already been 
advised, placed the name of Mr. Coravin at the head 
of the Clay electoral ticket, for the success of which he 
did yeoman's service throughout the State. 

His election, the ensuing winter, to the United States 
Senate, as successor to the late Judge Tappan, again 
placed Mr. Corwin in a position favorable for the exer- 
cise of his powers as a debater; but for a time he seemed 
as chary of obtruding his remarks upon the attention of 
that body as he was while occupying a seat, some ten or 
a dozen years previous, in the other branch of Congress. 
He did not participate prominently in the discussions 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 25 

until our country was involved in the war with Mexico. 
His first remarks of any considerable length were made 
in behalf of the soldiers in that war, and in able advocac\' 
of their receiving bounty land. The debate on this sub- 
ject came on while the bill for the increase of the army 
was pending, and was continued at intervals during the 
consideration of that bill. In the course of it, he answered 
some objections of Senator Benton in a style peculiar to 
himself, and the no slight discomfiture of that great 
Missouri statesman. Such pithy sentences as the follow- 
ing, as Mr. CoRwiN would utter them, in answer to the 
treasury-saving arguments of that distinguished Senator, 
would be felt by him with more than ordinary force: 
'■ Sir," said Mr. Corwin, " shall we drive a Jew's bargain 
" with our soldiers ? Shall we give a definite value for 
'- their patriotism ? Shall we count every groan ? Shall 
'• we give value for every drop of blood ? Shall we pay 
" so much for a soldier's life ? so much as a compensation 
" to the women and children who have been made widows 
'•and orphans by the war? Shall we give them an esti- 
" mated sum as value for their loss?" 

It is noteworthy that Mr. Corwin's remarks upon 
this subject were commenced nearly a month before 
the delivery of his great speech on the Three Million 
bill. Had they been spoken afterwards, they would 
have borne the seeming aspect of an attempt to smooth 
the ripple he then raised in the current of his popularity 
by his bold denunciation of the war. His sentiments in 
favor of rewarding the men who have to bear the brunt 
of whatever results from the action of a nation's rulers, 
fortunately, therefore, can not be attributed to any such 
motive. But even the liability to which a less auspicious 



26 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWDT. 

moment for their delivery -woulcl have subjected him, 
never would have deterred a man of his moral courage 
from giving them utterance. 

The speech on the Three Million bill, or "Mexican 
"War Speech," as it is best known, has been compli- 
mented by some of the greatest minds in the civilized 
world. The concluding portions of it have been quoted, 
again and again, as among the finest specimens of 
American eloquence. That speech, for bold assertion 
of truth, regardless of the unpopularity of the senti- 
ments enunciated, has seldom, if ever, perhaps, been 
equalled in any legislative body, in any nation. 

It is one of the inconsistencies of human nature to 
yield often what is known to be right to a fancied expe- 
diency ; and it is not surprising that many who cordially 
approved of what Mr. Corwin then said, should have 
objected to its promulgation. The opponents of the 
party with which Mr. Corwin then acted, seized upon 
the strong and emphatic language used by him, and 
distorted it to suit their own purposes. Many of his 
ardent and devoted admirers regretted, at the time, that 
he did not leave much of it unsaid, and not thus, by 
taking the unpopular, though they doubted not, correct, 
side of the question, voluntarily injure his prospects for 
a higher and more successful future, to which they hoped 
and believed he was rapidly tending. It was natural 
that the mere politician should thus view it. Mr. Cor- 
win' s more chary compeers, though they must have been 
equally imbued with the truth he spoke, were " wiser in 
their generation;" and, as the world goes, may have 
snatched a portion of its temporary successes by pru- 
dently inclining to a temporizing policy. But, however 



MEMOIE. OF THOMAS CORWTN. 27 

that may prove to be in the end, who is there now 
among his friends and admirers, or anywhere in a Chris- 
tian land, that does not commend the honest expression 
of his conscientious convictions, upon a subject so fraught 
with great consequences as then were hkely to flow from 
the prosecution of that war? His course then (observes 
a writer) " marked him before the nation and the workl. 
"He has dared to think as his conscience bade him — to 
" think and speak boldly what he thought. His enemies 
" may denounce him as a traitor, and his friends reproach 
" him for imprudence ; but thinking men of the present 
"times can not but honor his manly independence, as 
"posterity will assuredly commend the virtue that is dis- 
" played in it." * * * "In his opposition to appro- 
" priations for a farther prosecution of the war, he 
"certainly, at every risk of disadvantage to his personal 
"influence, took the highest ground of opposition to 
" executive misrule ; and, whether right or wrong in the 
"judgment which marked his course, he has won a 
"reputation for integrity and firmness of which any 
" statesman of the age might well be proud." * 

After the termination of the Mexican war, the dis- 
position of the newly-acquired territory furnished the 
fruitful theme of contention which the opponents of the 
war anticipated. The question as to the power of Con- 
gress over the territories, in regard to the institution of 
slavery, then became the exciting one, which has ever 
since so largely occupied the attention of the National 
Legislature, and caused the disintegration of political 
parties as they then existed. Mr. Corwin's speech in 

* American Review for September, 1847. 



30 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the Senate, on the 24th. of July, 1848, enters deeply into 
this subject; and he discusses the powers of Congress 
with the ability of a profound constitutional lawyer, and 
well-read statist. Upon this subject there has been appa- 
rently a marked change of opinion among certain poli- 
ticians since that period. Mr. Corwest, however, now 
holds to the same views which he then held — at that 
•time entertained almost unanimously by the opposition 
to the Democratic party, and now the principle con- 
tended for, with but few exceptions, by the opposition 
in all the non-slaveholding States. Upon the speech 
to which the writer refers, the Louisville Journal then 
remarked : 

" In the speech on the Compromise bill, Mr. Corwin 
"has displayed, in an eminent degree, all the great 
"features of his massive mind. The oft-repeated sophis- 
" tries of slavery, the formulas that have passed from 
"mouth to mouth among those who love to be deceived, 
"those paltry, rickety things that seem to be heir-looms 
" of perpetualism, are trampled into dust by Mr. Corwin 
"with as much disdain as Mirabeau spurned and tram- 
" pled on the formulas of royalty. When did falsehood 
" ever receive a quietus more effectually than tliis men- 
" dicant plea of the ultras for more slave territory, on 
"account of their worn-out lands?" 

The same article from the Journal contains the follow- 
ing highly-wrought eulogy : 

" A leading feature of Mr. Corwin's character is 
"devotion to truth; and he follows her paths with the 
"enthusiasm, the spirit and the fortitude of a martyr. 
"In the worship of that heavenly essence, he discards all 
"personal considerations; he never seems to pause to ask 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 29 

" what may be the personal consequence of anything he 
"may feel required to do — it is enough for him to learn 
" where truth marks the line of duty, to secure his obe- 
" dience. 

" This trait of Mr. Corwin was eminently displayed 
" on the Mexican war question. His lucid mind as clearly 
" saw the consequences of his course upon that question 
" as his experience now feels them. He deliberately sur- 
"veyed his ground, and duty made him brave the fires 
" of persecution and the anathemas of party. It would 
" be as easy to make a slave of Mr. Corwin as it would 
" be to make him a demagogue. He stood up before the 
" country as a man who dared to do what he considered 
"right; he made no appeal to the aura popularis ; he 
"felt the spirit of the ancient sage expressed in the 
" sentiment, ' I love Socrates, I lOve Plato, but I love 
" truth more than either.' " 

" While reading the debate, we could not but feel 
"that Mr. Corwin towered in the Senate like a giant 
" among pigmies. Every one that couched a lance with 
"him seemed to be ridiculously small. While following 
" his great mind through the intricacies of this subject, we 
" felt that we were in a blaze of light, and we could not 
" but remember Ben Jonson's description of truth. We 
" seemed to stand in the very presence of that glorious 
"figure, whose 

" ' Spacious arms do reach from East to West, 

"And you may see her heart shine thro' her breast; 

" Her right hand holds a sun with burning rays; 

" Her left, a curious bunch of keys, 

" With which Heaven's gates she unlocketh, and displays 



30 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

" A crystal mirror hanging at her breast, 

"By which men's consciences are searched and drest; 

" On her coach-wheels Hypocrisy lies I'acked, 

" And squint-eyed Slander, with Vain-glory backed. 

"Her bright eyes burn to dust, in which shines Fate; 

*' An angel ushers her triumphal gate ; 

" Whilst with her fingers fans of stems she twists, 

" And with them beats back terror, clad in mists : 

" Eternal unity behind her shines, 

" That fire and water, earth and air combines. 

" Her voice is like a trumpet, loud and shrill, 

" Which bids all sounds in Earth and Heaven be still.' 

" There is not a man in the country who can strip a 
" subject of its verbiage more effectually than Mr. Corwin. 
"With a keen and bold eye, and a steady hand, he dis- 
" sects the sophistries and false logic of the advocates of 
" error, and he follows falsehood through all its doubling 
"and involutions with a practiced skill, which no in- 
"genuity can elude. 

"Nothing seems to escape his eye in analyzing an 
" untenable position. His powers of sarcasm are great, 
" and they sparkle amidst the strength of logic like gems 
" that deck the brow of purity and beauty." 

In the briefer remarks of Mr. Corwin in the Senate, 
he is not less effective. An instance of this, showing at 
the same time the utter absence in him of those narrow 
ideas of public economy so frequently evinced in the 
defeat of meritorious claims, while huge speculations are 
winked at, is to be found in his remarks in favor of the 
bill for the relief of William Darby. This relief was 
proposed in consideration of valuable geographic informa- 
tion availed of by the United States from early surveys, 
made by Mr. Darby, of the south-western boundary. In 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 31 

advocating this claim, Mr. CoRwm admirably contrasted 
the disposition of the Government to reward leaders of 
military expeditions, which drive off the Indians, "ele- 
vate" the American flag, and carry the "American eagle 
into lands where he never soared before," with its tardy 
inclination to compensate the achievements of science, and 
labors in the less exciting walks of peace, from which it 
derives equal profit and advantage. His defence of Judge 
McLean against the animadversions of Senator Foote 
upon sentiments expressed, as a private citizen, by that 
able and worthy jurist, is in that cool, good-humored 
severity of style which delights an audience while it 
tortures the victim at whom it is aimed. 

As the head of the Treasury Department, Mr. CoRwm 
pursued, in the main, the line of policy which prevailed 
while that branch of the Government was under the 
direction of his immediate predecessor, Mr. Meredith. 
His first annual report to Congress upon the finances of 
the country, was presented on the 17th December, 1850. 
In this communication he recommends: 

1st. A change in the ad valorem system — imposing 
specific duties on all articles to which they may be 
safely applied. 

2nd. If the system of specific duties should not be 
adopted, then the home, instead of the foreign, valuation 
should be introduced. 

3rd. If neither of those changes should commend 
themselves to Congress, then the rates then prevailing 
should be increased upon a variety of articles, which 
might bear such increase with a salutary effect upon 
trade and revenue. 



32 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

The following extracts embrace some of the arguments 
adduced in favor of the foregoing recommendations: 

" The ability of the country to discharge every obliga- 
"tion upon it, if aided by wise and timely legislation, is 
" unquestionable. If ample provision shall be made for 
"the prompt discharge of annually accruing liabilities, 
"the public faith, as it has been hitherto, will be main- 
" tained, and the public credit continued on such a basis 
"as to insure an advantageous and speed}^ extinguish- 
" ment of the public debt. 

" The system of ad valorem duties, however well 
"adapted to many articles of trade, w-hen applied to all 
"without discrimination, restriction, or safeguard, has 
"been proved by the experience of this department to 
"be subject to many and strong objections. Its tendenc}'' 
"is to cherish a spirit of overtrading, greatly injurious 
"to the industry of our own country in all its depart- 
"ments, and, in its final results, fatal to the revenue. 
" Considering this system only in its operation upon 
" revenue, it is believed that the experience of the most 
" enlightened commercial nations of Europe has proved 
"it to be impolitic and unsafe. 

* :!< }}; >i« ^ * 5i- ?!; ^ 

" The primary object to be kept in view in levying 
" duties upon imports, is admitted to be revenue. It is 
" equally well established, as the policy and duty of the 
" government, so to discriminate in the le^^^ing of duties 
" as, without falling below the necessary amount of rev- 
" enue, to give the greatest encouragement possible to all 
" the industrial pursuits of our own people. One feature 
" of the law of 1846, in the opinion of this department, 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 33 

" is opposed to both the controlling principles just stated. 
" I have reference to an equal or higher rate of duty on 
"the raw material than upon the manufactured article 
" of which it is composed. Such provisions certainly 
" take from the manufacturer and artisan that encourage- 
" ment which the present law doubtless, to some extent, 
" was intended to aflbrd, and also check the importation 
"of the raw material to a degree detrimental to the 
" revenue. 

" The constant fluctuations in prices, and consequently 
"in the duties, under any unrestricted ad valorem tariff, 
"give to the act of 1846 that most objectionable feature, 
"instability. These variations, giving a high duty when 
"least required, and low duties when prices are ruinous, 
"tend to an excess of importations, and subject all the 
"products of labor in our own country to the frequent 
"and enormous fluctuations in the markets abroad, 
"arising from the disturbed condition of those nations 
" with whom our foreign commerce is chiefly carried on. 
" Under the present system, duties are highest when the 
" article imported is highest, and when the purchaser 
" and consumer can least afford to pay the duty ; and 
"lowest when the price of the article wanted would 
"allow a heavy additional duty to be levied on it. 
"Thus, if an article costs ten dollars, a duty of thirty 
" per cent, would compel an addition of three dollars ; if 
"that article falls in value to five dollars, then is the 
" duty reduced one-half. 

" That can not be a wholesome system of taxation 

" which follows the consumer in his purchases, increasing 

"his burden when prices are high, and taking it off as 

"prices fall, and his ability to bear it increases. If 

3 



34 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

" applied to articles of subsistence, it would operate as a 
"heavy tax upon bread in a year of famine, increasing 
" with the intensity of the evil, and gradually disappear- 
" ing with the return of abundance." 

^ ;i< * Hi * 

" Our revenue, as already stated, must be mainly 
" dependent on duties on imports. Those imports from 
" abroad can only be paid for by exports made up of 
" the products of our labor in all its varieties, or in the 
"precious metals. If our imports shall exceed the value 
" abroad of our exports in any given year, to the extent 
" of such excess do we create a foreign debt. If this 
" operation be repeated for only a few years, it is obvious 
" that it will effect the withdrawal from us of a quantity 
"of the precious metals equal, or nearly so, to the amount 
" of the accumulated debt, bringing with it bankruptcy 
" in all departments of business, consequent inability to 
" purchase foreign goods, and thus, for the time, causing 
" a ruinous depression in the receipts into the treasury. 
"It then becomes equally the duty of Congress and the 
" interest of the people, if possible, so to regulate imports 
" as to confine the importations into this country to an 
" amount about equal to such exports of our own as can 
" find a market at remunerative prices abroad. 

" The bare statement of the foregoing well-established 
"laws of trade would seem to furnish a safe guide in all 
"legislation on the subject. 

"Whilst importations should be secured in amount 
" sufiicient, at practical rates of duties, to supply the 
" wants of the treasury, such duties should be adjusted 
"in a manner to affect favorably all industrial pursuits 
" at home. If duties on the necessary importations should 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 35 

"have the effect to impair the ability of the mass of the 
"people to purchase and pay for foreign goods, then 
" importations to that extent must cease, and by conse- 
" quence the revenue to an equivalent amount would be 
" diminished. 

"It is believed that our own experience has shown 
" that our exports can not be greatly extended, as some 
" have supposed, by low duties upon foreign goods in 
" our ports. It is a fact within the observation of all, 
" that merchants and ship-owners are ever vigilant and 
" alert, with all the knowledge that interest can impart, 
" and all the skill which experience can supply, to send 
" abroad any and every product of this country which 
" can anywhere find a profitable market. These agencies, 
"which are always active, extend our export trafiic, at 
" all times, to the utmost limit of advantage to the pro- 
" ducer or carrier. If, at any time, a given article of 
" export should be carried beyond the foreign demand, 
" reduced prices, the invariable result of oversupply, 
"bring loss upon all concerned. If a foreign article 
" is in like manner forced upon our own market beyond 
" the required supply, the effect of reduced prices, while 
" it inflicts often ruinous losses upon the importer from 
" abroad, is felt by those engaged in producing the like 
" article at home in consequences tenfold more injurious, 
" as the reduction of price in our own market extends 
"to and afliects the entire labor of the whole country 
" which may be employed in such manufacture or pro- 
" duction. Thus, while the injury is temporary and 
"limited in its eflfect upon the importer, it is often 
" lasting and widely extended upon the labor of our own 
" people. We see and feel it in the sudden breaking up 



36 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

•' of establishments not yet sustained by an amount of 
" capital wbich can afford to encounter temporary sus- 
" pension of sales and reduced prices, or not yet worked 
"witb that skill and economy which loTig experience 
" alone can impart. In such instances, labor is suddenly 
"Avithdrawn from a diversity of pursuits, and driven to 
" production in a limited sphere. This again brings an 
" oversupply of whatever may be produced by the com- 
" mon employments, while, in the end, it leaves the 
" market of the article, whatever it may be, the pro- 
" duction of which has been abandoned at home, at the 
" mercy of the foreign supply alone. 

" The result, in the end, to the consumer, is invari- 
" ably a rise in the price of such article ; and, there being 
" no competition with the foreign producer, he has pos- 
" session of the market, and of course supplies it at the 
"highest price which the demand will give him. His 
"prices and profits, unchecked by competition in such 
" cases, continue to rise with the increasing demand and 
" diminishing home supply. 

" The operation and effect of these laws of labor and 
" trade, it is believed, have been frequently and palpably 
" exhibited in the history of our country. It is from 
" such experience that the general principles upon which 
" our tariff laws are based have become the common 
" opinions of the people. Hence the almost universal 
" impression in our country prevails, that, in assessing 
" duties on foreign merchandise, such discrimination 
" should be made as will have the effect of producing 
" all articles which can be manufactured at home in such 
" quantity, if possible, as to raise up two markets for the 
"purchaser and consumer — the home and the foreign — 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 37 

" each competing with the other, so that he may not be 
"left to the mercy of one, and that the foreign one, 
" alone. 

" The happy indirect effect of such legislation upon 
" the labor, and consequently on the permanent pros- 
"perity, of our own country, is not the greatest, by any 
" means, of the blessings it confers. By giving diversity 
" to the occupations and industrial pursuits of the people, 
"labor is rewarded, the ability to consume foreign pro- 
" ducts is attained, and the wants of the national treasury, 
" dependent entirely upon duties collected upon foreign 
"imports, are amply supplied. While the great end, 
"that of a competent revenue, is thus surely reached by 
"this policy, a larger amount of exports is, at the same 
"time, obtained towards paying for the required im- 
" portations. 

" Our exports, as the commercial statistics will show, 
" are made up mainly of cotton, rice, tobacco, breadstuffs, 
" and provisions. These are the products of the soil, and 
"are shipped to foreign ports without more labor, as an 
" element of price, than is necessary to fit them for market 
" in their first and simplest condition. Our statistics dis- 
" close the fact, also, that breadstuffs and provisions, of 
" which we can produce a larger surplus than any other 
" people, form comparatively a small addition to our 
"exports, particularly in years of plenty abroad. 

" These articles, in the production of which so large 
"and interesting a portion of our people are engaged, 
"can not find a market abroad at such prices as the 
" farmer can afford to receive, except when famine or war 
"creates a foreign and exceptional demand. 



38 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

" When it is remembered that a very large proportion 
" of the citizens of this country are engaged in the busi- 
" nes3 of farming, and how much of the permanent wealth 
" and true glory of the republic depends on their well- 
" being and prosperity, it would seem to be the dictate 
"of enlightened selfishness, as well as a duty of patriot- 
" ism, so to mould, if possible, the laws regulating trade 
" and revenue, as to furnish for them at home a perma- 
"nent market, with remunerating prices. As no such 
" market can be found abroad, it may well suggest the 
"inquiry whether legislation, in providing, of necessity, 
"for revenue, shall not, by encouraging a diversity of 
"employment in our own country, secure the only safe 
" and sure market for our farming productions which 
" can be obtained." 

Mr. Corwin's administration of the Treasury Depart- 
ment continued less than two years and a half, during 
which period the majority in Congress differed in its 
views of financial policy from those entertained by the 
executive branch of the government. It was, therefore, 
not a favorable time for the adoption of the foregoing 
suggestions. The influx of the precious metals from the 
gold region, then recently acquired, stimulated the im- 
portations of foreign merchandize, and revenue from 
imposts continued to flow into the national treasury. 
Although to Mr. Corwin the illusiveness of this pros- 
perity was apparent, and the establishment of a more 
healthy system of national finance much to be desired, 
the existing policy remained unchanged. A large surplus 
over the annually accruing liabilities of the Government, 
remained in the sub-treasury vaults when his successor 
became invested with the management of the fiscal 



MEMOIR OP THOMAS CORWIN. 39 

department, in 1853; and this plethoric condition con- 
tinued until, in 1857, a very general desire was mani- 
fested to lessen the income from duties upon foreign 
imports. 

It is, perhaps, less owing to the changes then made 
in our revenue regulations, than to the natural conse- 
quences of the " overtrading "_ against which Secretary 
CoRwm admonished Congress, in 1850, that the treasury 
has since suffered a collapse, and that an executive of a 
different political school favors, to some extent, the adop- 
tion of specific instead of ad valorem duties. 

Mr. CoRwiN, in his professional practice since his 
retirement with the administration of President Fill- 
more, has, on frequent occasions, shown his wonted skill 
in combatting evidence before a jury, and his forensic 
powers at the bar. The public press has given meagre 
representations of some of these later efforts; but they 
fail to impart to the reader anything like a correct idea 
of his style of eloquence. Even for the most expert 
stenographer it is difficult to report him fairly; and in 
every attempted synopsis, he suffers from the good inten- 
tions of the person who volunteers to make it. Still 
more, in his political speeches, is he victimised by the 
newspaper reporter. The latter will most likely fold his 
arms, and listen to the genial humor and sprightly Avit 
with which his remarks generally abound, and, in the 
enjoyment of such a treat, will omit to take note of the 
profound knowledge he displays of what true statesman- 
ship should be. Indeed, it often seems as if the "world" 
of his admirers were the least appreciative of Mr. Cor- 
win's real merits, and that they have acquired a habit of 
looking only for entertainment in his speeches, instead 



40 MEMOIR OP THOMAS CORWIN. 

of listening to the profundity of a philosopher, and Avell- 
read, deep-thinking statesman. 

Among the prominent men of the day, there are few 
who appear before the public on great occasions as 
orators, who have not previously written out at length 
the remarks which they intend to deliver, or who are 
not attended by competent reporters, looking carefully to 
their fame as public speakers. It is not unusual for th6 
press, ere the speaker has warmed his seat in the rail- 
road train on his homeward way, to be busy throwing 
ofl' copies of the oration, glowing with eloquent words, 
the utterance of which, an hour previous, stirred no soul, 
nor kept awake an impatient auditory. Such is not Mr. 
Corwin's habit, nor have his speeches this lack of effect. 
It will surprise many, no doubt, who know his reputation 
as an orator, that a single volume should embrace all his 
reported speeches; but he has never taken any pains to 
perpetuate any that he has delivered. This is no affected 
modesty on his part — it results from the utter unselfish- 
ness of his nature. He has been known to keep back 
from publication one of the few written addresses that he 
ever delivered, out of regard for the feelings of a gentle- 
man who feared that his address on the same occasion 
would, in such event, appear to disadvantage. Though so 
many of his extempore efforts are thus lost to the reading 
public, the memory of them will always linger with those 
who were so fortunate as to hear them; and to this 
recollection of the masses, wherever he has spoken, is to 
be attributed the permanent hold he has upon their 
affections. The mere mention of his name brings up a 
volume of what they have heard him say — at the bar, 
defending criminals, or at political gatherings, indulging 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWEST. 41 

in satire against demagogues. One can scarce converse 
with any person acquainted with him, who will not 
cite some occasion when Mr. Corwin excelled all other 
speakers; or some important law-suit, in which he carried 
the jury with him; or who does not remember some of the 
familiar anecdotes (many of them apocryphal, no doubt) 
with which his name is connected. 

There is one characteristic common to all Mr. Corwin's 
political addresses, and that is his earnest exhortations to 
the proper and unfailing exercise of the elective franchise. 
He never fails to admonish the people that they have 
the power to make and unmake rulers ; and that the 
evils in government, which they are so apt to charge 
upon the executive and other elective officers, avh the 
results either of their own remissness in refusing to vote, 
or in their not taking pains to vote intelligently. He 
habitually warns the people that a neglect or disregard 
of the privileges they enjoy — among which none can 
exceed this right of suftrage — may, as history has proved 
it will, end at last in their losing them.* 

* Upon this topic, Mr. Corwin spoke with great effect, at Dayton, 
Ohio, on the 30th September, 1858. The Journal of that city thus 
notices that portion of his speech : 

"The close of Governor Corwin's speech was one of the most 
"thrilling eloquence and power. He appealed to the people to exer- 
" cise the reason and the conscience which God had given them to 
" decide how they should vote. The power conferred upon the voters 
" of this nation was a tremendous power. It was one, for the faithful 
"exercise of which, or the failure to exercise which, they would, as 
"he believed, be called to answer at the great day. It was a power 
"all potent for good or* for evil; and as the Almighty, in his provi- 
" dence, had given men brains to think, and consciences to tell them 



42 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

The extract which follows gives a fair analysis of Mr. 
Oorwin's oratorical powers : 

" As a public speaker, Mr. Coravin is gifted far above 
" the ordinary standard of parliamentary experience. His 
" manner is perfectly self-possessed ; his thoughts flow 
'' forth in the most lucid forms ; his language is in the 
" purest taste — always strong, though frequently in a 
" high degree erratic. In all his eiforts, whether of the 
" more elaborate or of the lighter kind, he fixes attention 
" in the outset, and holds it, unbroken, to the end. It is 
" evidently one of the secrets of his power, that he knows 

" the right from the wrong, they could not hope to escape a fearful 
"reckoning for negligence or unfaithfulness. 

" He said that as he had traveled through the country, and beheld 
" the church-spires and school-houses, it seemed to him incomprehen- 
" sible how, with the advantages of education and of instruction from 
"the pulpit, there could be a generation of men who would disregard 
"the lessons of experience and the teachings of history so much as to 
" fail in the giving of an intelligent and patriotic vote. 

"Governor Corwin proceeded, with a glowing eloquence of words 
"and a sublimity of thought, to draw from sacred history the most 
"pointed exemplifications of the duty made imperative by the divine 
" command, to give heed to the things which make for the peace and 
"honor and glory of our common country. The hand of the Almighty 
"was as plainly to be seen in the interposition in our behalf during 
"the revolutionary struggle, as it was in the rolling of the waves of 
" the Red Sea over the hosts of Pharaoh as they were pursuing the 
" Israelites. We could not hope to escape the fate of the ' chosen 
"people," in whose history was so terribly fulfilled the words of 
" prophecy, unless we appreciated our blessings, and struggled to 
"preserve our birthright; and yet the history of man seemed to be 
" the same in all ages. Three thousand years ago, when the Almighty, 
"by a miraculous exercise of his power, had brought the cliildren of 
" Israel out of their Egyptian captivity, we found them, when it might 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 43 

when he has exhausted a subject, and where to stop. 
He is so clear in his conceptions, and exact in his 
arrangement of them, that he never repeats himself; 
and hence never ofl'ends, as do many of the best 
speakers, by occasional indications of a want of 
thorough understanding of their own minds. 

" In the mixed walks of eloquence, when under the 
excitement of a great subject, and a grand and respon- 
sible occasion for the discussion of it, Mr. Corwin often 
exhibits powers which could hardly be excelled. He 
has moments of intense strength, in which he seems to 
rise, unconsciously, high above his own ordinary level, 
and to wield, with almost superhuman power, the 
grandest thoughts ; setting them forth in the sublimest 
images, and clothing them in the most beautiful forms 
of speech. On occasions that properly admit of the 
application of the highest powers of wit, his efforts are 
unrivalled. His quick perception of the weak points 
of an adversary's position, and, if open to ridicule, his 
ready association of them with the most grotesque forms 



have been supposed that the wonder of the miracle was still impress- 
ing them with its awful grandeur, worshipping a golden calf! 

'' The prophet Isaiah, in denouncing the sins and the punishment 
of Judah, had said : ' The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his 
master's crib; but Israel doth not know — my people doth not con- 
sider.' The people did not 'consider' — they did not iJiinh Every 
man should break away from the trammels of party — he should 
thinh — think for himself— and so discharge his duty, as if knowing 
that upon him alone rested the responsibility of faithfully and 
honestly acting for the welfare of the twenty-six millions of this 
nation — as if he were the only man who had a vote — as if he were 
possessed of despotic power, and his will was the law." 



44 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

" of exposure, give often, even to liis grave speeches, a 
"force and influence which the severest logic would 
"utterly fail to give. The amiable and gentlemanly 
"temper, moreover, with which he exerts these high and 
"even dangerous powers, saves him from all hazard of 
"giving personal oifence in the application of them, and 
"it is proverbially said of him, that the object of his 
" satire is usually among the most entertained of those 
" who listen to it. The treat is too rich to be quarrelled 
" with, even by the victim whom it would annihilate. 

"But, after all, the most striking and captivating 
" feature in his speaking is, that he allows no doubt in 
" his auditory of the entire sincerity of what he is saying. 
" It is a man uttering great and important truths, under 
" the impulses of deep conviction, and not a mere declaimer 
" or advocate, who would produce effect for an occasion. 
" And this great feature of Mr. Corwin's speaking, which 
" stands out so prominently in every speech he makes, 
"no matter what the audience, the place, or the occasion, 
" is the necessary result of that self-culture which, in his 
"habitual studies, keeps the watches of an honest and 
" conscientious heart in constant company with the labort^ 
" of a clear, serene, and self-poised mind." * 

l^ot only is Mr. Corwin eminently distinguished for 
Iiis happy faculties as a public speaker, but he is unsur- 
passed in conversational powers. He is the centre of 
every social circle in which he may happen to mingle, 
and the most sprightly, as well as the most profound, 
are prone to give ear to the "wisdom and the wit" 
which then pass trippingly from his tongue. His char- 

* American Review. 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 45 

acter, personal, professional, and intellectual, is well 
drawn in the same article from which the preceding 
extract is quoted. 

" Mr. Corwin's private life, from boyhood up, has been 
marked by the strictest virtue and the most stainless 
honor. His professional career, as a part of it, has been 
distinguished for benevolence and justice. His social 
qualities are of the highest order, and impart the hap- 
piest influence upon all who are so fortunate as to 
enjoy the advantages of them. Few men excel him in 
colloquial power, or in the range of intelligence to 
make it the most attractive. His life has been one of 
laborious study, and his mind is highly charged with 
useful learning and well-digested principles. He has 
read much, and with careful discrimination — applying 
the most careful thought of his own mind in the specu- 
lations of others. However, his opinions on all subjects 
are uniformly his own. ]^o man is more unpretending 
in his attainments, or more modest in exhibiting them; 
but, at the same time, no man can be more decided in 
resisting the prescriptions of mere authority. His mind, 
in its philosophic spirit, is formed mainly upon the 
principle of self-reliance; and he values and uses learn- 
ing as a means to help him think rather than to supply 
him with thoughts. It is, however, high proof in favor 
of the principles of any party or category with which 
he may sympathize and act, that they have been 
thoroughly thought out by him from their simplest 
elements, and finally adopted by him as ascertained 
truths, he allows no mere party reasons for his con- 
victions, and wants no party aid for their support." 
Mr. CoRWiN rather unexpectedly became a candidate 



46 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

for the Thirty-sixth Congress; but, at the same time, 
that fact was hailed with delight by the voters in the 
district who, nearly twenty years previously, had the 
privilege of casting their ballots with his name at the 
head. Kor was his re-appearance in public life less wel- 
come beyond the limits of his district or State. Men 
possessing his physical and intellectual vigor, with the 
advantages of ripe judgment and large political expe- 
rience, are deferred to as counsellors and guides in the 
weightier matters of the nation. His election was chron- 
icled in different quarters of the Union, as a disposition 
on the part of the people to avail themselves of the 
services of their best men; and that evidence was thus 
given of the conservative feeling which, in this free 
Republic, is cherished by its citizens, even at times when 
the most ultra radicalism seems to prevail. Thousands 
greeted him again at the hustings, and listened eagerly 
to the manly and independent expression of his views 
upon the topics of the times. 

He now occupies the proud position of one who is 
chosen as a national legislator, not strictly as a party 
man; for he expressly dissented, in his public speeches 
during the canvass, from some of the views entertained 
by many of the party which elected him.* That he can 

* Upon the subject of the powers of Congress in relation to the 
Territories, he is reported to have spoken as follows, at a meeting 
near Byron, Greene county, Ohio: 

"The right of Congress to make all needful regulations for the 
"Territories he considered indisputable, and he would attach some 
" such rule as the Wilmot Proviso to every Territory on its organiza- 
" tion. He knew the advantages of it in the results of the Ordinance 
" of '87. Congress bore the same relation to the Territories as a guar- 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 



47 



have it truly said that he entered upon this trust un- 
trammelled, is alike creditable to himself and the liberal 
and intelligent constituency that proffered it to him; and 
it presents to the country at large an instance of inde- 
pendence on the one hand, and of toleration and conti- 
dence on the other, worthy of all commendation. 

Since his election to Congress, Mr. Corwin has min- 
gled freely in the discussion of political questions. He 
was a delegate in the Republican State Convention, at 
Columbus, Ohio, which nominated, as its candidate for 
Governor, William Dennison, jr., whom he accom- 
panied through a portion of the State in the canvass 
which has recently* terminated in that gentleman's 
election. 

Mr. Corwin's addresses, during this last campaign, 
manifested an earnestness and energy calculated to im- 



dian did to his ward. As a member of Congress, he would act as a 
faithful guardian, bring up the Territories 'in the way they should 
go,' and counsel them 'never to depart from it.' But when a Terri- 
tory was emerging into a State, it was becoming 'of age.' He could 
do no more than point out the benefits of its early training, and if it 
chose to deviate from his teaching, he could only regret it. It was 
then, as the minor become of age, its own master. Congress having 
passed an enabling act, permitting it to make a constitution and set 
up for itself, could not, he thought, consistently refuse it admission 
into the Union on account of a clause in its constitution, when we 
had in the Union fifteen States with similar constitutions. If we had 
no power to turn out States on that account, we should not keep them 
out. Here he read from the remarks of John Quincy Adams — good 
authority with the most ultra anti-slavery men — on the admission of 
Arkansas, showing that in this view he only re-affirmed what that 
eminently wise statesman uttered." 
* October, 1859. 



48 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

press the public with tlie importance which the result 
would have upon the issues of the day. The doctrine 
of " Popular Sovereignty," as promulgated by a dis- 
tinguished leader of one political school, furnished, upon 
some of these occasions, a theme for him to exercise his 
characteristic power of dissecting opinions, and of show- 
ins: the incons^ruities and inconsistencies of these modern 
theories, as compared with the well-established and (for 
more than half a century) generally received views of 
the constitutional powers of Congress. He adduced, 
with telling effect, the fact of the earlier administrations 
agreeing upon these powers, with entire unanimity ; that 
among such men as Calhoun, J. Q. Adams, Crawford, 
and "Wirt, of President Monroe's cabinet, there was no 
difference of opinion upon a question which, in these 
latter days, is sought to be interpreted into something 
dissimilar to what it meant during that " era of good 
feeling." 

Mr. CoRWiN, whenever it seemed called for during the 
recent canvass, advocated, with his accustomed ability 
and decision of purpose, the duty of maintaining the 
supremacy of the law ; and discountenanced any other 
mode of redress for the real or fancied evils under which 
the citizens of the non-slaveholding States labored, in 
consequence of the reprehensible features in the act for 
the reclamation of fugitives from labor, than that which 
the people of a republic can peacefully and effectually 
apply by the exercise of their constitutional powers. 
The obligations of good faith required that each member 
of this confederacy should fulfill its part of the compact. 
There was a safe remedy for whatever of political incon- 
venience we temporarily endure, and laws of our own 



MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 49 

making, as we must admit all our laws to be (through 
our own selected agents), it did not become us to violate. 

He also reiterated, in these more recent political ad- 
dresses, his views, previously entertained, in relation to 
our system of providing the revenue necessary to cany 
on the Government, and illustrated the beneficent opera- 
tion of such impost duties as afibrded protection to every 
branch of American industry, without imposing burthens 
upon any class of producers. The effects which would 
be produced upon free labor by a resort to direct taxation, 
he failed not to depict in vivid colors. 

While deprecating, as he did, the virulence of party 
spirit, he admitted, in view of the imperfectibility of 
mankind, the necessity of the existence of parties. But 
his great aim, during the canvass, appeared to be to 
further the action of the people upon what he conceived 
to be safe and correct principles, without an exhibition 
upon their part of ultra partizan proclivities. To his 
efforts, it is not to be doubted, much of the conservative 
element in the opposition to the party now in the ascen- 
dancy in the General Government, was brought into 
active and practical exercise in favor of the candidates 
of that opposition in Ohio, and to its consequently 
triumphant results. 

But, however this may be regarded, Mr. Corwin has 
discharged simply what he conceived to be his duty — 
occupying the relation which he does to the common 
weal of the Republic. The sincerity of his motives no 
one who knows him will question. The sentiments he 
has avowed find their response in the hearts of all true 
men, who will neither submit to any violation of the 
rights of their own States, nor countenance a wrong in- 
■ 4 



60 MEMOIR OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

tlicted upon any other portion of this confederacy. They 
have been adopted from reflection upon views long-cher- 
ished and cahiily considered; and tliey will bear the test 
of a comparison with the doctrines taught by the framers 
of our Constitution and their patriotic contemporaries. 

In conclusion, it may be remarked, with full conti- 
dence, that in the part which it may yet be Mr. Corwin's 
fortune to take in the active oflicial affairs of this Gov- 
ernment, he will continue to exhibit the high-toned and 
independent course which has hitherto marked his politi- 
cal career ; that he will always be found, in voice and 
vote, in favor of the leading measures of national policy 
which he has heretofore so fearlessly and eloquently 
advocated; and that no motive of mere expediency, or 
party finesse, will swerve him from the course which a 
conscientious conviction of duty points out to him as the 
one for a devoted friend of his country and its true 

interests to pursue. 

I. S. 



SPEECHES 



OP 



THOMAS CORWIN. 



AGAINST CORPORAL PUNISHMENT. 

[In the House of Representatives, in the General Assembly of 
the State of Ohio, December 18th, 1822, upon the bill to introduce 
public whipping as a punishment for petty larceny, Mr. CORWIN 
addressed the Committee of the Whole as follows :] 

Me. Chairman: 

I never rise to offer my opinions to this iiouse 
without feeling a powerful impression of the many 
embarrassments which I am obliged to encounter. 
This, sir, does not originate from a servile dread of 
your criticism, or the consequences of declaring thus 
publicly and to the world the honest convictions of 
my heart. No, sir, it arises from a more natural 
and a more honorable cause ; it proceeds from that 
deference which is due, and which we almost instinc- 
tively pay, to age and experience, and a conscious- 
ness that I am wasting the time of this house in 
vain, when opposing my arguments and judgment 
to the well-formed and authoritative opinions of my 

(51) 



52 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

^'enerable friends. Under these circumstances, I do 
assure this committee I should have considered my 
duty discharged by a silent vote upon this bill, had 
not my professional j)ursuits frequently compelled me 
to give a careful and often painful examination to 
most of the subjects involved in its policy. 

In the 23rosecution, and sometimes in the defense 
of criminals, I have had frequent of)portunities of 
viewing and considering the occult and secret sources 
of crime, more distinctly than I possibly could had I 
been an unconcerned observer. I will venture to 
assert, that there is not, in the whole circle of society, 
a situation so favorable to the discovery of the true 
nature and causes of crime, as a practice at the bar 
of a court of criminal jurisdiction. There you may 
l^ehold, as from an eminence, the whole area over 
which w^e are now about to pass. Here you see one 
class of mankind, whose orbit seems to have been 
fixed and revolutions all performed within the regions 
of vice. Others again, of more equivocal character, 
who, without any settled system of action, or deter- 
mining force of disposition, have been impelled for- 
ward in a wild and eccentric direction, and occasion- 
ally and accidentally passed within the hemisphere 
(if crime. With these advantages, I would hope not 
entirely unimproved, I have formed an opinion on 
the subject opposed to the principles of the bill, 
which all the very able and ingenious arguments 
of the gentlemen on the other side have not induced 
me to relinquish. I shall not differ with the gentle- 
man from Highland [Mr. Collins] as to the great 



AGAINST CORPORAL PUNISHMENT. 53 

objects of crimiiijil law. By imposing certain penal- 
ties upon the commission of specified oifenses, it is 
intended to reform the convicted culprit, and by the 
example of his punishment to finghten others from 
the yet untrodden paths of iniquity; and thus, by 
operating upon that principle common to all, an 
aversion to pain and privation excite in the mind 
a thorough abhorrence of the crime which is thus 
necessarily connected with misery. All these point 
to the great and primal object of both divine and 
human government — the preservation of right, and 
the promotion of human happiness. The scourge, 
uplifted by the first section of the bill, is brought 
forward as an auxiliary in this great and benevolent 
work. About the ends to be accomplished there can 
be no diflference of opinion : the adaptation of this 
instrument to the accomplishment of these ends is 
the only subject of dispute. But, sir, when Ave con- 
sider the variety of considerations necessarily con- 
nected with the subject of crime and its punishment, 
and that each of these is to be carefully weighed in 
the balance of judgment, and the proper weight and 
value assigned to each, before a correct result can be 
had, it is not surprising there should exist an honest 
difference of opinion as to the means by which the 
grand object in view is most likely to be insured. 

I am satisfied, if the gentlemen who advocate this 
bill would examine themselves closely, they would 
find that considerations very remotely connected with 
the true principles of criminal jurisprudence, have 
contributed very powerfully to the establishment of 



54 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

their present opinion. I am confirmed in this belief 
by the reiterated arguments of the friends of the bill, 
drawn from the expensiveness of the system at pre- 
sent in force. Your present mode of punishment, 
say they, must be abolished ; the expense is intoler- 
able, and can no longer be borne by the counties. Let 
us examine, then, for a moment, this argument, and 
see whether its intrinsic weight is such as to give it 
the first rank among the reasons for abolishing the 
old and adopting the new law now proposed. It will 
be admitted, that the first and main designs in adopt- 
ing any system of criminal law, are to reform the 
criminal, and by his punishment, to deter others 
from imitating his conduct, and committing similar 
crimes. 

This admission is sufficient of itself to show the 
comparative weakness of all arguments which pro- 
ceed from a calculation of costs. It surely requires 
no argument, to prove that the money expended in 
procuring the punishment itself, can have no effect 
in producing those consequences, for the sake of 
which you are alone warranted in passing any law 
upon the subject; that is, the reformation of the cul- 
prit, and the security of your right, by holding out 
the terror of his example to others. For instance, 
would a post and whip, which should cost five hun- 
dred dollars, have an eifect ujoon the criminal or soci- 
ety, in any respect different from one equally strong 
and powerful, used in the same manner, which should 
not cost the tenth part of that sum ? The punish- 
ment is alike severe in both cases ; the eftect u[)on the 



AGAINST COEPOKAL PUNISHMENT. 55 

criminal liiinself and upon those who witnessed his 
l)iinishnient, would be precisely the same in the for- 
mer case, which costs five hundred, as in the latter, 
which costs but fifty dollars. If the price, at which 
the punishment can be procured, is the first and most 
important consideration, then the gentleman, to be 
consistent, should abandon the measure now proposed, 
for many systems of punishment may be devised, 
much cheaper than even the swift and summary ven- 
geance of the whipping-post and the scourge. This 
view of the subject may enable us to form something 
like a correct estimate of the argument of expense so 
long and so frequently urged. Still, sir, I would not 
he understood to argue, that in the enactment of a 
law of this kind, we should pay no regard to the 
expense which will be incurred, in carrying that law 
into etfect ; but I would show^, by these remarks, that 
this argument can only be made eifectual, when it is 
]U'oved in support of it, that the operation of the law 
is so expensive as to bear no reasonable proportion 
to the good efi'ects resulting from it. 

There are some among us, I believe, who are in 
favor of the bill upon the table, who are, neverthe- 
less of opinion that fine or imprisonment is a pun- 
ishment more appropriate to the crimes we are 
enacting upon. They tell us they detest and abhor 
the vile and bloody instruments with which they 
propose to arm our courts, and that they do not 
expect their property will find a more efficient pro- 
tection from these agents than it has formerly expe- 
rienced from fine and imprisonment; that they are 



56 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

willing to adopt a law which they believe to be w rong 
and impolitic, with the hope of reducing the taxes, 
and relieving the existing burdens of the people. Sir, 
the people have required no such sacrifice at your 
hands; they have not petitioned you tor relief; they 
have not prayed you to redeem them from this gTiev- 
ous oppression — ^this "Egyptian yoke." Grentlemen 
have mistaken the clamors of a few selfish individ- 
uals for the voice of the State. If it were true, as 
has been represented, that the cries of the State had 
resounded from one extremity of it to the other, they 
would have been heard within these walls in the con- 
stitutional mode; your tables would have groaned 
beneath the weight of their petitions. The people, 
sir, are not idle, or inattentive to their interest, nor 
are they so selfish or aA^aricious as to sacrifice the 
general interest, honor, and prosperity to such sordid 
and pecuniary considerations. Ask yourselves the 
question, would you not rather sacrifice the pitiful 
sum that would be drawn from your own pockets, to 
pay this item of expense in the administration of the 
law, than to introduce these ornaments of the slave- 
driver into your temples of justice ? 

The whipping-post and the lash are indeed beau- 
tiful appendages to the public buildings of your coun- 
ties ; and wdien the traveler, attracted to your shores 
by the fame of your unexampled growth, in every- 
thing which marks the character of a great and 
enlightened State, shall inquire of you the use of 
that post which occupies a station so commanding 
among the public buildings of Ohio, what answer 



AGAINST CORPOEAL PUNISHMENT. 57 

will you give? You must tell him the truth; and 
you may inform him, that it is a deity that is wor- 
shiped by the seven hundred thousand inhabitants of 
Ohio ; that his peculiar attributes and qualities, are 
a love of money, and a thirst insatiable for human 
blood ; that his voracious stomach is regularly, three 
times a year, gorged with his favorite drink, drawn 
from the veins of your citizens by the application of 
whips and scourges. Complete the story if you can, 
and tell him that for this he saves in your pocket 
from iive to ten cents a year!!! But, sir, I will dis- 
miss this point, and proceed to consider what is in 
truth a much more important branch of the present 
subject — the nature and effect of the punishment 
itself. The dispute now is between the stripes on the 
bare back, as proposed in this bill, and the fine and 
imprisonment of the old law. In the view which I 
propose to take (in a few words) of these two modes 
of punishment, it will be necessary to keep steadily 
in our sight, the nature and character of the person 
upon whom the punishment is to act, and the ends to 
be accomplished by its infliction. Here I would use 
the very instance produced by the gentleman from 
Highland, in support of the bill, guided by the uner- 
ring laws of human nature: let us test this example, 
and let experience decide whether the conclusion I 
shall draw be true or false. Let then the person Ije 
an old offender, hackneyed and trained in the ways 
of wickedness : by an habitual communion with de- 
pravity, his sense of shame is destroyed, and his love 
of reputation extinguished; his crimes shall have 



58 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

fixed upon him the abhorrence of all who knew him, 
and broken every tie which once held him in a state 
of social existence. Such a being, it is argued, can 
only be punished by the infliction of stripes; the 
l)lunted sensibilities of such a wretch, it is said, can 
only be roused and acted upon by the tremendous 
apparata of vengeance, furnished forth in the first 
section of the bill. This, sir, is a conclusion which I 
can not admit; my mind directs me to a result 
directly opposed to the one at which my friend has 
arrived. I shall very readily admit, sir, that persons 
may be found approximating very nearly at least to 
the character described. Suppose him bound and fet- 
tered to the whipping-post; imagine, if you please, all 
the playmates of his childhood, the companions of 
his youth, and the graver acquaintances of his riper 
years, to be present surrounding the place of his sup- 
posed disgrace, and punishment. WTiat, sir, to such 
a being as we have imagined, would this be, or what 
effect would it haA'e? A^'^ould he be overwhelmed and 
dismayed at the frown and disdain of the multitude ? 
Xo, sir; aware of this, he would arm himself with 
triple insensibility. Lost to all sense of shame, he 
looks upon their scorn and abhorrence with muscles 
unmoved, or a smile of contempt. Bankrupt in char- 
acter, and with no desire to redeem a ruined reputa- 
tion, he looks forward to their future detestation as a 
thing with which he had long been familiar, and 
about which he is utterly indifferent. The whip, 
then, as the gentlemen have argued, is the only pos- 
sible eneniv with which he is to contend — he has 



AGAINST CORPOEAL PUNISHMENT. 59 

nothing more to arm himself against but the lash. 
The surrounding multitude, all the parade and prepa- 
ration of the scene, are idle pageantry to him ; and 
if he can but harden his nerves, and fortify his flesh 
with the proper degree of insensibility, he can endure 
with equal stoicism and unconcern the severest cor- 
poral pain that human ingenuity can invent, or 
human power inflict. If it can be shown that man 
(when it is necessary, and when properly schooled for 
the purpose,) can endure with comparative ease the 
severest corporal pain, then I think it is fair to con- 
clude that this would be the case in the instance 
before us. Be assured, the old and well-practiced 
criminal has not been such a careless observer of 
human events, as not to have anticipated the proba- 
bility of punishment and prepared for its arrival; 
and when he sees the bustling and eager crowd 
assembled for the very purpose of beholding his 
humiliation and feasting upon his torment, you need 
not be surprised if all the energies of his depraved 
and hardy nature were called into action to disap- 
point the still more brutal expectations and desires 
of the mob. 

Hard as this triumph of our nature over pain (its 
natural enemy) may seem, thousands of examples 
could be produced to prove it an object of easy ac- 
quisition. Look to the history of the Indian tribes 
of America, when the vanquished warrior unfortu- 
nately survives a battle in which his tribe has been 
beaten, and himself made prisoner. The conquest 
is not complete until the victor chief has exerted his 



60 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

system of torture upon the captive. The excellence 
of this scheme of cruelty is made to exist in the 
length of time it will continue its severity, without 
destroying the sensibility of the victim. Yet such 
is the power of human nature, Avhen fully exerted, 
that malice, when she has exhausted all her inven- 
tion, is often disappointed of her wdsh, and obliged, 
at last, to behold the unconquered son of the desert 
standing amid his torments, with as much ease as if 
he were reposing upon his own native hills, breathing 
the fragrance of the wild flowers of the desert, and 
surrounded with all that could soothe the soul and 
gratify the sense. 

So it will be with the old, the stern and obdurate 
malefactor. It would be found impossible to inflict 
stri2:)es uj^on him with such severity as to produce 
any effect upon him at the time ; of course, as to 
himself, the effect, if any, must cease to operate the 
moment he is discharged. But, sir, Avhat impression 
will those receive who witness this impotent attempt ! 
The answer is obvious. The abhorrence of his crime, 
and the terror of its punishment, are all lost and for- 
gotten in the admiration created by the fortitude and 
indifference of the culprit under the influence of the 
scourge ; and the whole transaction leaves no impres- 
sion upon the mind of the beholder, except that he 
had Avitnessed an unavailing attempt by an officer to 
inflict a severe punishment upon a convicted villain, 
who obstinately and triumphantly resisted all his 
power. Loose your criminal from the post, and in 
an hour after all this has happened, you shall find 



AGAINST CORPORAL PUNISHMENT. 61 

him celebrating his victory in drunken revehy with 
his licentious companions. 

But, sir, it does by no means follow that there is 
no punishment which can have the washed for effect. 
Yes, there is a punishment by which he may be 
made to suffer: meet him, oppose him in the very 
principle which prompts and urges him to the perpe- 
tration of crimes. A love of abandoned company, 
and an aversion to the labor and confinement of 
honest pursuits, have impelled him to seek a live- 
lihood in the violation of your laws. Let him know, 
then, that, in the pursuit of his favorite enjoyments, 
the moment he passes the prescribed limits of the 
l^w, he shall forfeit the very boon he seeks. Show 
him that he must exchange his wild and erratic inde- 
pendence for the chains and bolts of a prison ; that 
his favorite companions must be forsaken for the deep 
solitude and tenfold horrors of a dungeon. Here he 
shall be deprived of the wild and spirit-stirring plea- 
sures which enabled him to avoid reflection upon his 
crime. If it be possible, by human agency, to reform 
and punish a being such as I have described, they 
are to be expected under circumstances like these; 
cut off from all his once-loved pursuits, and deprived 
of all external objects of reflection, he is compelled 
to commune w^ith his own mind. The sounding 
scourge and hissing snakes of his offended conscience 
drive him, in desperation, to that open sepulcher — 
the naked human heart. Then, and then only, does 
the conscious mind become its own awful world ; and 
the hardened wretch that a short time before bid 



62 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

defiance to all the terrors of penal justice, noAv, alone 
and subdued, cowers and sinks under the weight of 
her retributive vengeance, 

" In pangs that longest rack and latest kill." 

tSurely, if there be punishment against which our 
nature can oppose no adequate force ; if there be 
terrors which can arrest the hand of wickedness in 
the half executed crime, they are to be found in the 
darkness and loneliness of solitary confinement — in 
the dungeons of a jail. 

JS'ow, sir, let us turn, for a moment, to another and 
very different character, but one who may often be 
the subject of that punishment now proposed for our 
adoption. He shall be one who has acted not from a 
fixed and resolute disregard of moral obligation or 
social duty, but rather from a thoughtless impetuosity 
of disposition, which frequently hurries men, other- 
wise virtuous and honorable, to the commission of 
crime. He may be one who has acted under a strong 
and imperious necessity. I will suppose him to be a 
young man. He may be the pride and only hope of 
his humble but respectable parents ; but, in an un- 
guarded moment, or under the influence of strong 
and uncontrollable necessity, he has done a deed 
which brings him to the whipimig-imst, Need I pur- 
sue this description further ? Need I ask the vener- 
able gentlemen to place themselves in the situation 
of such a father? Is there a man upon this floor 
who could see the back of such a strii:>ling bared to 
the inhuman scourge? No, there is not one; the 



AGAINST COBPOBAL PUNISHMENT. 63 

mover of this bill could not, its best friends could 
not, endure such a sight. Where, then, is the influ- 
ence of an example which none can behold — which 
no father would permit his children to see ; or what 
kind of law, I ask, is this which, in its operation, 
violates and outrages the first, the original, the best, 
the fairest attributes of our natures ? If the sheriff 
should do his duty on such an occasion, he would 
bring down upon him the execration of all who knew 
him ; if he fails in his duty, the law is a mockery 
and its administration a farce. 

What effect will this have upon the offender him- 
self? Will he be reformed by your punishment? 
"No, no one will pretend it; because it is a kind of 
punishment calculated to stimulate the angry and 
vindictive feelings of the soul, and not to subdue the 
depravity of the heart. Loose your victim, and again 
driven out from among men, he goes forth a desperado, 
a wretch, prepared "to war with men and forfeit 
heaven." 

There are many other views which might be taken 
of this subject, against the policy of the law, but I 
fear I shall weary the patience of the committee. 
There are, however, some further objections to this 
bill, which, in justice to my own feelings, I can not 
omit. All writers on the subject of criminal law 
agree, and the common sense of every man will con- 
firm the opinion, that the certainty of punishment 
should be regarded more than any other considera- 
tion, in the enactment of a criminal code. Will this 
grand primary object be obtained by the passage of 



64 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

this bill? I answer, it will not. If you tell me this 
punishment is more severe than line and imprison- 
ment, and therefore preferable, I answer that, in pro- 
portion as you increase the severity of the punish- 
ment, so in proportion do you diminish the certainty 
of its infliction; courts will be more scrupulous and 
technical in motions to arrest judgments and to quash 
indictments; juries will not convict for an offense so 
readily, where the punishment is cruel, as when it is 
more lenient. Here, again, I must appeal to the ex- 
perience of every gentleman who has been at all 
conversant with the courts of justice, for the truth of 
this remark. But, sir, there is a better reason than 
this. I still believe that public opinion revolts at 
the idea of this species of punishment, and I will 
defy any man, however strong and cogent the proof 
may be, to produce a conviction, in five cases in ten, 
where the punishment consequent upon the verdict is 
odious and detestable to the jury. Your offenders 
would here see the opinion and sympathies of the whole 
community perpetually engaged in their behalf, and 
acquittals would take place where guilt w^as manifest. 
Thus, sir, is the first great consideration (a moral 
certainty that punishment must and will succeed 
crime) lost sight of in the bill. This is of the very 
last importance — crime and punishment, in the ad- 
ministration of justice, should be linked together like 
cause and effect. But they are disjoined far as the 
poles from each other, and a conviction, with many 
juries, would be almost beyond the limits of proba- 
bility. 



A.GAINST CORPORAL PUNISHMENT. 65 

But I am told there is a saving alternative for 
these cases ; the court may whip, fine, or imprison, 
or all, if they choose. I answer, juries will not trust 
their verdict to the mercy of the court. They will 
argue thus: "We may, by finding the defendant 
guilty, be the means of carrying him to the whip- 
ping-post; we can not tell what the court may do, we 
will rather acquit than risk the consequences which 
may follow a conviction." 

This alternative, which the gentlemen resort to as 
the salvation of the bill, is to my mind one of its 
most objectionable features. It is a fact well-known, 
that some counties in the State will never, under any 
circumstances, resort to the whipping-post, while they 
have any alternative left; it is equally certain that 
in some circuits you would seldom hear of fine and 
imprisonment, and all would be whipped. In this 
way we should produce this strange phenomenon in 
jurisprudence ; a general law made for the whole State 
alike, operating in one part of the State in a way and 
with tendencies widely dififerent from its operation in 
another part of the same State. If it be true as 
contended, that the whipping-post is to moralize, re- 
form, and christianize wherever it goes ; and if it be 
true that the present system encourages vice, frauds, 
and pampers crimes, what kind of population shall 
we have in Ohio? Where whipping prevails, we 
shall behold a pious race, strictly observant of all the 
mandates of the decalogue, and full of the wisdom 
that "exalteth a nation." But where fine and im- 
prisonment are the punishment, vice, unbridled and 
5 



66 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

lawless, must riot upon the peace of the country, 
cursed with all the crimes that are a "reproach to 
any people." There will be, in the circuit protected 
by the whii)ping-post, none but Israelites without 
guile; pass but an ideal boundary, and in the adjoin- 
ing district now you have but devils incarnate. This 
motley and discordant population must be the result 
of the operation of this law, if there be that wonder- 
ful difference in the modes of punishment which is 
contended by the friends of the bill. 

Permit me, sir, to ask one question more, and I have 
done. Under the administration of the old law, have 
we not experienced all the good order and social 
peace that can be expected in the best regulated so- 
ciety; has there (since the adoption of that system, 
which is, I believe, about six years) been an increase 
of crime beyond the increase of population ? There 
has not. Who can or will deny this. But, sir, if 
there had been, it might be accounted for upon prin- 
ciples different from those which grow out of an in- 
sufficient law upon the subject of crimes. 

Within the time I have named, a regular army 
has been disbanded and let loose among us ; all that 
was vicious, depraved, and licentious in that army, 
has been poured in upon us, and mingled its corrup- 
tions with the elements of society. Yet with all this 
to contend with, your old law has struggled through 
the conflict, faithful, efficient, and adequate to the 
purposes of its creation. Do not suppose that I am 
detracting from the merits of the brave men who 
sustained their country's honor, glorious and untar- 



AGAINST CORrOEAL PUNISHMENT. 67 

nisliecl, throughout the struggle to which I have 
aUuded. Xo, sir ; I believe they would have carried 
your eagle in triumph round the globe, had they 
been commanded to do so ; yet, sir, the melancholy 
truth is still the same. The army is not a school 
of morality ; it is not a place where the peaceful vir- 
tues are taught or practiced. Let it not be forgotten, 
that this very kind of punishment has been disused 
and forbidden in the armies of a Bonaparte. 

Yet this fugitive from the dominions of a military 
despotism is to be naturalized and made a citizen of 
Ohio. I will present one case for the consideration of 
the military gentlemen of the house. Suppose an 
old soldier, with whom you had fought and bled, 
should become the subject of this punishment; un- 
used to the arts and avocations of peace, he has 
stolen a trifle, and is brought to the post. While 
stripping for the sacrifice, should you behold upon 
his rough and manly bosom the scars which speak 
of his bloody and heroic deeds at Orleans, at Chip- 
pewa, or at the Thames — is there an American arm 
that could be raised against him ? If there be such 
a wretch, he must have a heart harder than adamant, 
lower than perdition, blacker than despair. Sir, I 
must sit down. I ought, perhaps, to pursue the sub- 
ject further, but I must give place to those whose 
years entitle them to a greater share of the indul- 
gence of this house. 



MASONIC ORATIOK 

[Delivered at Hamilton, Ohio, June 24, 1826.] 



Fellow-citizens and Brethken: 

The pleasure which I should feel in having been 
distinguished by your confidence on this interesting 
occasion, is much impaired by the humiliating con- 
viction that I shall not do justice to your humblest 
expectations. The particular cause of this painful 
embarrassment must be obvious to that portion of 
this numerous assembly, which belongs to the Ma- r \ 
sonic family. The anniversary which has called us 
together has been celebrated by us, for many cen- 
turies j^ast, with sacred and undisturbed punctuality. 
You will therefore at once perceive, that all the ^ 
topics which are naturally suggested by the occasion 
have been essayed and exhausted by the highest 
order of mind which a succession of ages could pro- 
duce. The path prescribed to me, is not only strewed 
with the fairest flowers of speech, but it is cultivated 
and adorned on every side, with the rich creations of 
the most exalted intelligence. Thus situated, the con- 
spicuous position to which I have been called by the 
kind partiality of my brethren, would be appalling 
indeed, were I in the j)resence of an audience unac- 
quainted with my pursuits in life, and my humble 



MASONIC OEATION. 69 

pretensions in public declamatory address. To these 
considerations I feel it due myself to add, that my 
professional engagements, for several months past, 
have been such as to preclude even the possibility of 
presenting you with any production, however brief, 
characterized by study and preparation. These 
remarks are not submitted from any servile fear of 
your criticism, for I have not the vanity to believe 
that the brief and undigested observations I shall 
make will be deemed of sufficient importance to ren- 
der them the subject of either censure or applause; 
but they are offered in justice to the fraternity whose 
humble organ I am, that you may not form a hasty 
judgment of Freemasonry from what you may chance 
to hear from me under circumstances so unfavorable 
to a fair development of her principles. There are 
doubtless many present who would be gratified to 
know the particular reasons which induce us to 
adhere with such rigid exactitude, to the celebration 
of this day as a Masonic festival. This natural curi- 
osity may be gratified by a few obvious considera- 
tions. 

We have assembled in accordance with a very 
ancient usage among Masons, to offer our public 
homage to the memory of St. John the Baptist. The 
propriety of perpetuating the memory of striking 
events and illustrious men by anniversary celebra- 
tions, can be inferred from the practice of every 
nation in every age of the world. In the early stages 
of human association other means were employed 
to insure this noble and beneficent purpose. A 



70 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

pyramid of stone, a misshapen tomb, with traditional 
narratives transmitted by hereditary piety from age 
to age, served to inform the unlettered savage of the 
gratitude he owed to the hero of his tribe, or the law- 
giver of his nation, whose memory otherwise, the 
ever-rolling current of years had overwhelmed in 
oblivion. The Romans wisely preserved in conse- 
crated temples, lasting memorials of the founder of 
their empire, and the enlightened Greeks, availing 
themselves of the art of sculpture, perpetuated in 
marble the sages and heroes of their race. Thus did 
the early benefactors of nations live for centuries 
beyond their natural existence, and continue to make 
salutary impressions upon succeeding times. Modern 
anniversaries, sacred to the memory of those whose 
virtues have created eras in the history of man, have 
this end in view, and subserve in a higher degree the 
same valuable design. 

For these reasons, as often as the wheels of time 
roll on the nativity of John the Baptist, as Masons 
we are taught to separate our thoughts from the 
cares that waylay all our paths through this world, 
and concentrate our reflections upon the exalted 
qualities which characterized this extraordinary^an. 
He, our traditions inform us, was an active and" firm 
adherent to the grand tenets of Masonry, and our 
Masonic injunctions require us to revere him in the 
double character of an inspired servant of the most 
high Grod, and a devoted supporter and patron of our 
ancient institution. By this custom — consecrated by 
time, approved by reason, and sanctioned by the 



MASONIC ORATION. 71 

holiest aspirations of the heart — we hope to superin- 
duce in our lives and conduct a closer approximation 
to the virtues which marked the character of our 
patron saint, in whose life we are taught to believe 
the pristine beauties of brotherly love, relief, and 
truth shone forth in effulgence unfading, without a 
cloud to shadow their radiance from an admiring 
world. The most careless observer will see, at a 
glance, the striking difference between this and almost 
every other public festival known to the present age. 
We do not assemble to immortalize the achievements 
of a (Conquering general, or to rejoice at a fortunate 
victory over the contending foe. We meet to com- 
memorate the reign of peace, and cherish those re- 
tiring virtues of the heart that shun the glare of 
public show, and extend to the afflicted and obscure 
their unseen beneficence. Hence, in our public exhi- 
bitions, there is nothing to excite the strong emotions 
of the soul. The wild tornado that levels whole 
cities with the ground, and whelms your navies in 
the devouring seas, impresses the mind with a horror 
that time can seldom efface ; while the common air 
that keeps the mysterious machine of life in motion, 
and is everywhere diffusing health abroad, scarcely 
excites a passing thought. The lofty mountain, whose 
lone summit is robed in volcanic flame, arrests the 
imagination with an intensity that no object, however 
pleasing, can divert; while the extended plain, whose 
humble shrubs and flowers and fruits bring abun- 
dance and happiness to all around, is seen without 
emotion, and passed by without a single reflection. 



72 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

But in a much more important particular is this 
anniversary distinguished from those of a political or 
purely national character. If we assemble to com- 
memorate the achievements of a general, who by 
slaughter and conquest has contributed to national 
renown, the cannon's roar, and the victor's trophy 
necessarily associate with them the memory of em- 
battled fields and conflicting hosts. Is the banner 
of victory displayed, imagination sees in its train 
"famine, sword, and fire crouch for employment." 
Do we gaze with rapture upon the laurel that en- 
circles the concj[ueror's brow, the noble ecstacy is 
repressed when fancy beholds it crimsoned over with 
the blood of the slain, and grasping with its tendrils 
the cypress that weeps over the vanquished, perhaps 
the generous foe. ^ Even on our own national festival, 
whose annual return reminds us of our happy deliv- 
erance from a foreign yoke, the angry remembrance 
of a hated and vindictive foe mingles in our most 
fervid gratitude to heaven, and stains it with the 
black hue of revenge. » Far diff'erent are the feelings 
which the recollections of this day inspire. The 
emblems displayed by us speak only of the peaceful 
triumphs of virtue over vice, and indicate a charity 
and good-will as wide in their desires and action as 
the globe itself. Delineated on the clothing we wear, 
is the temple of Masonry. Behold its ample dimen- 
sions ! Its indestructible foundations extend fi'om 
north to south, and sweep from the farthest east to 
the remotest west. It tells j^ou that her expanded 
portals are open to receive the just and upright in 



MASONIC ORATION. 73 

heart of every tongue and clime ; that the arms of 
Masonic charity inclose within their fostering em- 
brace the entire family of man. Tm^n your eye to 
that star — it is emblematical of that which guided 
the wise men of the east to the birth-place of the 
Redeemer. Contemplate, for a moment, those par- 
allel lines — one of these represents St. John the 
Baptist, the harbinger of the long-promised Messiah. 

How richly instructive the reflections, and how 
sweetly accordant to the impulses of Christian piety 
are the emotions which these exhibitions are calcu- 
lated to wake up in the mind and heart; the obstrep- 
erous note of the battle-song is still, the shout of 
\ictory is hushed, while the soul, attuned to harmony 
and peace, breaks forth in the cherub strain that 
announced the advent of the Savior, "Peace on earth 
and good-will toward men." Another striking char- 
acteristic of our symbols is the ancient date to which 
they evidently refer. They remind us that Masonry 
existed in times long gone by. That temple would 
indeed seem to assert the origin of Masonry to be 
coeval at least with Solomon, its illustrious builder. 

Upon this subject it may be observed, that the 
time when Masonr}^ began to exist is a matter of 
small importance, when compared with its true ten- 
dency and design. Yet since this is a point upon 
which there is much curious speculation among men, 
and about which there is some contradiction and 
more conjecture among those distinguished for their 
knowledge of ancient history, I will, in passing, sub- 
mit to your consideration some facts which bear uj^on 



74 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

this much contested point. In doing this, I shall 
unavoidably notice some things which will show the 
moral character of Masonry, and the use which a 
mysterious providence, in ancient times, has made 
of our Order. History is not silent in regard to the 
ancient existence of Masonry, though from the very 
nature of this society, its identity could not be dis- 
tinctly traced along the track of time, and made 
public by historical record. 

It has never been denied that Masons are to be 
found in almost ever}^ country which has been sub- 
jected to modern discovery. Nations who have had 
no intercourse whatever with each other, diifering in 
language, manners and laws, have seen their subjects 
meet for the first time, and recognize each other to 
be members of the Masonic fraternity. In every 
quarter of the globe, however, the grand features of 
Masonry are found to be the same. Tins is true in 
regard to tribes and countries where letters and the 
arts are extinct, and where commerce and modern 
improvement have as yet made no impression upon 
the national character. This remarkable coincidence, 
which, I believe, is admitted by all, remains to l)e 
accounted for. To this end let me direct your atten- 
tion to the very few facts which I am at liberty here 
to state. We are informed l)y a writer whose intel- 
ligence and veracity has never been questioned, that 
most of the Tyrians who had been employed by Solo- 
mon in the erection of the temple at Jerusalem, after 
the completion of the building, returned to their 
native countrv. We learn fi-om the same source that 



MASONIC ORATION. 75 

about this time, many of the Jews who had been 
engaged in buikling the temple, migrated to Phoeni- 
cia, a country of which Tyre was at that time the 
principal city. This Jewish colony, for some cause 
left unexplained by the historian, was oppressed by 
its neighbors, and became weary of its possessions. 
In these difficulties they flew to their friends for 
relief. The Tyrians who had labored with them upon 
the temple at Jerusalem, mindful of their sacred obli- 
gations, which seven years' mutual toil, and the inter- 
change of all the kindly offices which their fraternal 
connection had induced, furnished their Jewish breth- 
ren with ships and provision. They took their depar- 
ture for a foreign land. If they, as workmen at the 
temple, had been invested wdth secrets not known to 
others, there can be no doubt but they preserved and 
carried them wherever they went. They left Tyre, 
passed the straits of Hercules and finally settled in 
Spain. They bade a final adieu, not only to their 
adopted country, but doubtless they bade a last fare- 
well to the land promised as a heritage to them and 
their posterity forever. In this mournful pilgrimage, 
if they possessed the secrets, there can be no doubt 
but they carried with them the sacred symbols of 
Masonry, and in the land of the Gentile erected the 
altar and lighted up the lights of the Order. Strabo, 
whose general accuracy is surpassed b}^ no author of 
his time, informs us that about one hundred and 
ninety years after the Trojan war, which would be 
about fifteen years after the completion of the temple, 
a colony of Jews from Palestine made a permanent 



76 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

settlement on the western coast of Africa. From 
these three points we follow the march of Masonry 
throughout the world. In all the countries settled 
]jy emigration from these, or connected with them by 
alliance and commerce, Masonry is found, her signs 
the same, her mystic word the same in all. The 
most rational conclusion from these j)remises would 
seem to be this, that Masonry had its origin from 
some common source far back in the annals of the 
world ; and from the ceremonies and emblems of the 
Order, that source could be no other than Solomon, 
the king of Israel. It is also clear that Masonry 
began in the erection of the temple at Jerusalem, 
that temple designed to preserve the unadulterated 
worship of the only living and true God. These 
remarks can only apply to the six first degrees of 
Masonry. Let us ascend to the seventh, and see if 
there be nothing in the "Royal Arch" to show that 
this last had its origin with those great and good 
men who built the second temple upon Mount Mo- 
riah. There are a variety of facts derived from 
sacred history all tending to show that fi'om the 
death of Solomon to the completion of the second 
temple, the Pentateuch or five books of Moses were 
very rare, and that at one time, at least, they were 
belieyed to be entirely lost. Josiah, a prince remark- 
able in history for having restored the true worship 
of God at Jerusalem, reigned in Judea about fifty 
years before the Babylonish captivity. During his 
reign it is stated as a remarkable fact, ''Hhat the hook 
of the Jaw was found by Hilkiah the Priest w the house 



MASONIC ORATION. 77 

of the Lord'' That this was the only copy then 
known to be extant, is rendered certain from the joy 
expressed by the King at the event. We are told 
that when it was read to the good King, "he rent his 
garments," such were his transports in knowing that 
the sacred legacy of Moses was still in possession of 
his divided and afflicted people. From this time 
until the days of Ezra, a period of about one hundred 
and seventy years, we hear nothing in sacred history 
of the books of the law. The ark, it is well known, 
with the law and the covenant, always remained in 
the temple. As these were objects of sacred regard 
and religious veneration with the Jews, so, doubtless, 
they would have been most valued by ISTebuchad- 
nezzar, had they fallen into his hands when Jerusa- 
lem was sacked and the temple destroyed. Had 
they been captured by him and carried with the con- 
secrated vessels to Babylon, and there preserved, so 
important a fact could not have been overlooked by 
the sacred historian. But, from the silence of his- 
tory, all doubtless supposed the law and the testi- 
mony to be forever lost ; such, however, was not the 
design of Heaven. Where then do we next hear 
(after a silence of one hundred and seventy years) of 
this sacred deposit. 

The learned and proverbially accurate Dr. Prideaux 
assures us, that after the second temple was finished, 
there existed an association of men at Jerusalem, who 
had certain secrets unknown to the rest of the world ; 
that Ezra was the chief of this society, and that he 
was with his brethren many years engaged in tran- 



78 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

scribing the Ijooks of the hiw. Another historian, 
speaking of the same society, tells us that the Hebrew 
name by which they were known, signifies tradition. 
These facts would seem to establish two important 
particulars ; first, that there was then extant but one 
copy of the book of the law, it being an object of 
such great importance to increase the number; and 
secondly, that Ezra and his brethren who were 
engaged in this sacred duty, having secrets unknown 
to the world, and a name corresponding wdth a grand 
feature of Masonry, "Tradition," were Royal Arch 
Masons and practiced the rites of the "sublime 
degree." From these facts it would appear, that 
Masonry, reviled by ignorance, ' and persecuted by 
prejudice, was at this time the humble means em- 
ployed by divine providence to preserve the only 
revelation as yet received from God. 

The sacred temple had stood for four hundred 
years, the only altar not contaminated w^th idola- 
trous sacrifice. There within the "Holy of Holies" 
the law and testimony in the heaven-appointed 
custody of the Levite had safely reposed: but the 
conquering Chaldean came, Jerusalem is laid waste, 
the lofty columns, the porticoes and brazen pillars of 
the temple yield to the devouring flames, and sink in 
undistinguished ruin; the consecrated vessels are 
borne away in triumph, and the house of Israel is 
carried captive to Babylon. The law and the testi- 
mony are heard of no more, the feast and the 
sacrifice, the priest and the altar, are alike forbidden 
and hateful to the heathen oppressor; the captive 



MASONIC ORATION. 79 

Jew hung his harp upon the willows and wejit by 
the streams of Babylon. When they believed the 
ark and the covenant between God and his chosen 
people were forever lost, no wonder they mourned 
for the desolation of the city of David and exclaimed : 
"When I forget thee, oh Jerusalem, may my right 
hand forget her cunning!" After his long captivity, 
when he again returned to the land of his fathers, 
how did the soul of the pious Jew glow with gratitude 
to those, who had preserved the law and the testi- 
mony from the devastation of war, and the ruin of 
time, and again deposited the sacred book in the 
house of the Lord. When we take into considera- 
tion only the few meager facts, thus slightly sketched, 
we should suppose the pious Christian would pause 
before he denounces this unoffending Order, to which 
the best men have adhered for many ages past; 
surely the polite scholar, and the learned antiquarian, 
should hesitate before they join a censorious and ill- 
judging world in the assertion, that Masonry is the 
offspring of a barbarous age, that it is calculated for 
no great attainment, and has subserved no valuable 
design. 

If the ancient history of our Order is illustrious for 
having participated in great events, it will be found 
that its career in modern times is not less so, for 
having furnished a remedy for evils which could 
find no redress in any other of the institutions of 
man. A very brief retrospect of the history of our 
afflicted race will show a necessity for the establish- 
ment of a society having a sublime and pure morality 



80 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

for its ethics, and a scheme of benevolence toward 
man, enforced by penalties distinct from the common 
obligations of social or municipal law. The earliest 
records of man are replete with the history of his 
cruelties and crimes. He w^as indeed created upright 
in the image of his God, but alas how brief is the 
season of his continuance in his primitive state. 
Scarcely had the first family taken its social form, 
when the blood of Abel ascended to the skies, a 
melancholy witness to the apostasy of man, and a 
sure i^resage of his future career. Hence the faithful 
historian, trom Adam to the deluge, and fi'om thence 
to our own times, speaks only of tribe warring with 
tribe, power conflicting with power, till some warlike 
butcher, more fortunate than his peers, has brought 
contending communities and tribes within the grasp 
of his sole domination, and compressed them into 
one bloody mass, subdued and inert, upon which he 
exerts his uncontrolled dominion. Religion, it is 
true, held forth her persuasives to virtue, but in the 
estimation of thoughtless men, her rewards were 
valueless, because they were postponed beyond the 
term of his mortal career. Her dreadful penalties 
appalled him not, because they were to fall on him 
hereafter, and he hoped by amendment to avoid their 
infliction. The destinies of the world seemed to be 
committed to man, and he used his power only for 
the purposes of destruction. War, cruel and relent- 
less war, in every age has deluged the peaceful earth 
with the blood of its inhabitants, and imbittered it 
with their tears. Government and jurisprudence, it 



MASONIC ORATIOX. 81 

is true, in modern times, liaA'e done much for suffer- 
ing humanity. But, so various are the characters of 
men, so complex the structure of society, and so 
diversified the crimes with which it is afflicted, that 
the wisest statesmen have given up the task as hope- 
less, and submit patiently to endure evils which their 
utmost sagacity can not prevent. Treachery in 
fi'iendship, hypocrisy and deceit, and ingratitude 
that sin denounced by savage and civilized man, 
must still go unpunished. In despite of all political 
regulation, power will sometimes accumulate in the 
hands of the few, and the weak are subjected to its 
licentious sway. We still see oppression in some 
shape, pursuing its victim with the eye of the eagle, 
and the vulture's appetite. The philanthropist, with 
all his ardent desires for the happiness of his species, 
looks on in hopeless impotence. Here Masonry 
interposes ; power, wealth, and all the adventitious 
aids of fortune create no preference in her choice; 
she receives the sufferer within her walls, and throws 
the ?egis of her protection around him. If the purple 
of majesty, as has been the case, finds its way into 
the lodge, the monarch sees and confesses that his 
regal diadem is of no more value than the sordid 
rags of the beggar. Here all meet on the level of 
perfect equality. The brow of power unbends its 
haughty curve at the well-known sign, and the frown 
of anger gives place to the smile of conciliation at 
the "mystic word." There all are taught that stern 
perseverance in upright and virtuous life, can only 
give pre-eminence to one man over another. Thus 
6 



82 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

instructed and qualified the Mason goes forth from 
the lodge with new motives and added obligations to 
rectitude of life. However humble and unambitious 
his fortune or name, he goes forth with confidence. 
If he is "just and true," that confidence is never 
deceived. The fidelity of Masonry is universal, he 
shall not be forsaken. To whatever clime he 
wanders it is still the same, the language of Masonry 
is universal, he shall be recognized as a brother. No 
matter how adverse his fate, the charity of Masonry 
is universal, if worthy, he shall be relieved. Shall 
I be told that these are the fanciful theories of a 
creed that wastes itself in idle boast and empty 
show ? Was the immortal Warren, the fated martyr 
of Bunker Hill, the patron of hypocritical profession! 
Could the mighty soul of Washington stoop to 
hypocrisy, or be delighted with idle pageantry! 
Could the philosophic Franklin, who encountered the 
tempest and disarmed it of its bolt, be pleased or 
satisfied with boastful pretensions and ceremonious 
frivolity! Surely there is no American so base, as 
will not answer no. Yet Washington, Franklin, and 
Warren, bore their united testimony in our favor, by 
both profession and practice, while they lived. 
These three undying names, while they confer 
immortal renown upon the American character, 
shed also a halo of glory round the altar of Masonry, 
where they were often pleased as Grand Masters to 
preside. These things I have thought it my duty to 
say of a society of which many of your friends are 
members, not as a formal defense, but that Masonry 



MASONIC ORATION. 83 

may be judged by what she truly is, and not by 
ignorant assertion, or malicious conjecture. 

Permit me now, my brethren, in a few words, to 
solicit your attention to some of the prominent duties 
which our principles teach, and our penalties enforce. 
You have come together for the avowed purpose of 
offering your public testimonial to the virtues of one 
whose life, in our Masonic instruction, is constantly 
held forth as a model for every Mason's imitation. 
Temperance, that Masonic virtue so often neglected, 
and so solemnly impressed upon us in our lectures, 
was the most striking feature in the character of 
John the Baptist. Seeing, with prophetic vision, the 
important station he was to occupy in accomplishing 
the designs of his Master, he possessed a moral 
courage that raised him to an elevation of soul equal 
to the task. He appeared in the world among a 
people adverse in their habits to the abstinent, self- 
denying life he lived. The long and well-established 
reign of Polytheism brought the united religions of 
Rome, and all her tributary states, to oppose the 
peculiar doctrines he was commissioned to usher into 
the world. Rome herself, at this period, was rapidly 
marching to the full maturity of national sin. The 
laurels that bloomed round the tombs of her early 
heroes, were forgotten for the inhuman sports of 
gladiators and frivolous public shows. Her triumphal 
arches began to droop, and the stern integrity which 
characterized her early days had now expired in the 
sensual delights of the bath. Yet, in the midst of 
these allurements to luxury, his food was locusts and 



84 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

wild honev. Surrounded with obstinate bio-otrv, at the 
peril of his life, he marched with steady and fearless 
step, to the fulfillment of his masters' will, and when 
the arm of power was outstretched for his destruc- 
tion, he boldly proclaimed the wickedness of Herod, 
and foretold, in the startled ear of the tyrant, the 
coming vengeance of God. Chains and imprison- 
ment had no terrors for him ; for integrity of heart 
brought unconquerable fortitude to his aid ; and when 
his work was finished, disdaining that sycophantic 
spirit that might suggest a compromise with his 
oppressor, with dauntless confidence he met the blow, 
and like one of the Grand Masters of our Order, he 
sealed his fidelity with his blood. Had I the tongue 
of angels, still in this mirror you shall see more than 
words could possibly portray. Yet once more, my 
brethren, in the pure sj)irit of brotherly love, let me 
solicit your attention to that temijerance so conspicuous 
in the character of this holy man, that it is the first 
feature his biogTapher has sketched. - ISTo vice within 
our observation has so much degraded the character 
of Masonry, none has made such wide-spread ravage 
in the world, as the odious sin of intemperance ; it 
carries its annual thousands to an untimely grave, 
and an unprepared reckoning with their final Judge. 
Wliat renders it fearful beyond most evil habits, is 
the strange insensibility with which it invests its 
unhappy votary. The miserable victim of confirmed 
intemperance is cursed with a fatuity unassailable 
by reason or admonition. He deliberately prej^ares 
himself for the sacrifice, binds himself to the altar. 



MASONIC ORATION. 85 

and himself applies the fatal instrument of immo- 
lation. At this awful period, every vice follows in 
its train, reason is bewildered, conscience is be- 
numbed, the heart debased, and the noblest work 
of God sinks below the level of a brute. This fatal 
habit is often, nay, it is usually the offspring of idle- 
ness and inattention to the business of our proper 
Vocation, and that too fi'equently, in the season of 
youth. Strange, unaccountable stupidity! At that 
happy period when the intellectual powers are ex- 
panding, and the entire character beginning to 
assume a permanent form — in that delightful sccison 
of improvement, emulation, and hope — how many 
waste the precious years without one vigorous effort 
in any useful or valuable pursuit! Such take their 
downward course in life, barren of knowledge or 
virtuous habits, through a bleak and comfortless 
region of care, decrepitude, and sorrow. Thus a 
whole lifetime is often passed over, thoughtful only 
of the present hour, till the brink of the yawning 
gulf is seen ; but then it is too late to retreat fi'om 
the danger; and an age of careless, thoughtless inac- 
tivity is closed by a few hours of gloomy anxiety — 
of intense, ineffable horror. This is not the fiction 
of imagination ; it has been often realized and seen 
among us, where last of all it should be looked for, 
within the circle of Masonry. ]S"othing, I repeat it, 
has contributed so much to strengthen the common 
prejudice against Masonry, and impair its usefulness 
in the world, as the disorderly and vicious lives of 



86 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

some of its members. Wherever such are found 
among us, it is our first duty to apply all the correc- 
tives our principles afford ; to whisper wholesome 
counsel into the ear; and, by every means in our 
power, impress truth upon the heart. 

If all these fail to revive the dying spark of 
virtue — to ourselves and the world we owe the 
solemn duty — they must be cast out from among 
us. Such can only serve to create discord in the 
temple, and impede the labors of the true and 
worthy Mason. When we reflect on the many 
bland and beautiful persuasives to Adrtue wdiicli our 
ceremonies exhibit, and which our lectures unceas- 
ingly teach ; when we superadd to these those g-uards 
which furnish resistance to every approach of vice, it 
may fairly be assumed that none but a disposition 
fatally determined to wickedness could resist their 
conjoined impressions. But if, in despite of all 
endeavor, a brother continue incorrigible, "cut him 
down, why cumbereth he the ground!" 

When we shall have thus discharged our duty, 
Masonry shall arise and put on her beautiful gar- 
ments ; her doors then shall be thrown wide for the 
reception of the wise and faithful in heart of all 
the tribes and kindred of the earth, and be closed 
against the wicked, the faithless, and unworthy. 
Then may we confidently expect our reward. We 
shall have the gratitude of the destitute, whom we 
have cheered and fed ; the prayers of the wayward, 
whom we have reclaimed; the benedictions of the 



MASONIC ORATION. 87 

good of all the world, and the smiles of an approv- 
ing conscience, that 

" Which nothing earthly gives or can destroy, 
The soul's calm sunshine and the heart-felt joy." 

There are a few present whom I recognize as wor- 
thy Knights, who have sat in council, and convened 
in the Asylum. We should never forget this truth ; 
as we ascend in the mysteries of the Order, so in pro- 
portion are our obligations increased and the sphere 
of our action enlarged. That unbounded hospitality 
that greets and cheers the way-worn pilgrim of this 
world with ]3ure benevolence, unsolicited and un- 
bought; that courage and constancy which tread 
with untiring step the rugged road of virtue, and 
subdue each rising obstacle in their way ; that humil- 
ity and patience which melt away the natural asper- 
ities of our imperfect nature, and endure without a 
murmur the "thousand ills of life ;" that truth which 
is mighty above all things, which shall flourish in 
immortal green, when the heavens "shall depart 
as a scroll," these are the God-like attributes of 
your profession. The history of your Order though 
gloomy, nevertheless presents a grand exhibition of 
human nature. The sensation we feel in tracing it 
to its origin, though elevated and delightful, will still 
at times be tinged with melancholy reflection, ren- 
dered sublime, however, by the magnificence of the 
objects constantly in view. 

The hardy spirits who founded your Order and 
lighted up the sacred asylum in Palestine, were fired 



88 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

with zeal that no human eifort could resist. They 
had visited that land consecrated by the advent of 
the Messiah. They stood upon the shores of Jordan 
that had seen the descent of the Baptismal dove. 
They sat down and sorrowed upon those hills of 
Judea that had trembled at the miracles of a Grod. 
They saw with bitterness of heart the pious pilgrim 
spurned, robbed, murdered by the ruthless Turk. 
They beheld the stupid Mussulman exert a withering 
despotism over the inheritance of Jacob. They saw 
the mosque and minaret tower in impious grandeur 
over the tomb of Christ, and the chosen habitation of 
Israel seemed to them cursed on account of the infi- 
del possessor. The burning sun and the barren fig- 
tree of holy writ were still there ; riven rocks and 
half-open sepulchers still announced the prodigies of 
the crucifixion ; but dried up rivers, scorched and 
barren fields spoke to them the course of Heaven, 
and there the desert stretched out its burning arms 
in mute desolation, as if it had not dared to break 
the dead silence, since the "Eternal uttered his 
voice." 

It was amid these grand and gloomy scenes, that 
the founders of your Order called the council, and 
assembled round the triangle. Charity and hospi- 
tality were their objects — a charity that stooped to 
the unfortunate, that sought after the miserable, that 
raised the bowed down, that clothed and fed the 
naked, famishing pilgrim, journeying under the fer- 
vid heat of a Syrian sun, to die at the Redeemer's 
shrine. These were the original characteristics of 



MASONIC ORATION. 89 

Knighthood, and though the scene of action is now 
changed, such are still its high and holy professions. 
To this high-toned moral feeling, we are pledged by 
sacred obligation to conform our practice among men 
and with each other. 'T is for ourselves to determine 
whether we shall profess principles which exalt and 
sublimate the soul above the sordid selfishness of 
groveling mortality, and at the same time, cling to 
those vices that degrade, chill and brutalize all the 
generous aspirings of the heart. Surely it will not, 
can not be ; honor, conscience, and truth, " mighty 
above all things," forbid it. 

Lastly, my brethren, of every order and degree. 
If the duties of Masonry are of universal obligation, 
if they admit of no exception, if they are to be per- 
formed by the Mason of every country, under cir- 
cumstances however adverse, with what alacrity 
should we (who are cradled in liberty, and nursed in 
the lap of peace) go on to fulfill its benignant com- 
mands. How enviable, this day, is the lot of the 
American Mason, compared with the destiny of his 
brethren in other regions of the earth! Here the 
Masonic lodge rears its humble columns in our cities, 
cottages, and towns, fearless of danger from without, 
or treachery within its walls. When we go abroad 
on our festive days, the unseen arm of our happy 
government protects us from insult or opposition. 
The "Star and stripe," the consecrated banner of 
freedom, is proud to wave its protecting folds over 
the lambskin of Masonry. But avert your eye for a 
moment from this "green and sunny spot," throw 



90 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

your anxious glance over Russia, Austria, and Spain. 
Where is the humble Mason in these dreary realms 
to-day ? Roused by the natal morning of his patron 
saint, does he repair with crowds of his brethren to 
the social lodge? No. With fearful step he steals 
silently from the busy haunts of men, and with a 
faithful few ascends the mountain-top, or retires to 
the darkest recess of some sequestered vale. If the 
ever-vigilant eye of oppression pursue him there, a 
lingering death, "pangs that longest rack and latest 
kill," must be his fate; or exiled from home, he must 
seek in other lands a refuge fi'om the grave : 

"Nor wife nor children more shall he behold, 
Nor friends, nor sacred home." 

How often have we hailed on these happy shores, 
a Russian brother from the far Borysthenes, or 
from the banks of Guadalquiver, the Iberian exile, 
and heard them lisp in stranger accents, the sad 
story of their wrongs. From these we hear that 
Masonry, emphatically peaceful and unoffending, is 
proscribed by the half-civilized "Autocrat of all the 
Russias." There a jealous tyrant exerts his unceas- 
ing persecution, with every means which ingenuity, 
sharpened by malice, can invent, and with cruelty 
limited only by absolute power. In Sj^ain too, once 
the proud land of chivalry, the same misguided pol- 
icy haunts every step of the Order. The stupid Fer- 
dinand (whose regal honors serve only to degrade 
the fame of the once powerful Castilian house) 
dooms our temples to the flames, and for inculcating 



MASONIC ORATION. 91 

"charity toward all mankind," the Christian Mason 
dies upon the rack. Fell tyrant ! insatiate monster ! 
gorge thy ravening appetite with the harmless Ma- 
son's blood. Well hast thou waged exterminating- 
war upon the brethren of him whose arm hurled the 
first fatal bolt at the throne of tyrants. It was 
the spirit and example of our Washington, that 
rolled the retributive fires of revolution through thy 
affrighted dominions. But thy carnival shall be 
brief. The Architect of worlds has circumscribed 
the two Americas, and said, "here shall there be 
liberty and peace." Six fair republics, wrested from 
thy ruthless dominion, announce that retributive 
justice is nigh thee ; the handwriting is seen upon 
thy walls; the genius of desolation flaps her wing 
over thy palaces of pride, and expects her prey. 

Before I take leave of you, my brethren, let me 
again remind you of the vast debt of gratitude you 
owe to the Almighty disposer of human events, for 
that you have been permitted to pass the journey of 
life in this land and this age of the world. While 
the cloud of despotism throws its dun and troubled 
midnight over three quarters of the world, here we 
repose under the tranquil bowers of peace ; while the 
blended beams of improved science, rational liberty 
and pure religion throw their cheerful radiance 
around. May we not justly exclaim with Israel of 
old, " the Lord hath brought us forth out of Egypt, 
with a mighty hand, and an outstretched arm; he 
hath brought us unto this place, and hath given us 
this land?" But, if we believe our Masonic instruction, 



92 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIN. 

we shall not indulge the gloomy conviction that 
our happy destiny shall always remain exclusive. 
Masonry teaches us that man is capable of endless 
improvement in knowledge, and all the arts that 
adorn and glorify human existence. That progres- 
sion is evidently quickening its pace throughout the 
world, with each revolving year. The signs of the' 
times can not be misunderstood. The onward tread 
of science and civil liberty can not, will not be 
stayed ; it is the progress of man to that state 
designed and decreed by Heaven ; it is the march of 
mind- — what power shall withstand it ? It may pause 
for awhile, in the midst of some violent shock, but 
it will resume its progress with still stronger and 
steadier step, till ignorance and subjection let go 
their hold upon every slave, and the scepter fall 
powerless from the grasp of the last tyrant upon 
earth. Then shall that period arrive so long ex- 
pected and so ardently prayed for. It shall then no 
longer be necessary to the existence of governments 
to consecrate the names and vices of kings ; but 
human happiness shall be the basis of all political 
association, and enlightened reason insure a cheerful 
acquiescence in necessary municipal rule. Then shall 
the eastern Indian cease to adore the sun; the north- 
ern savage no longer shall seek his deity in the 
genius of darkness and storm ; the Hindoo shall for- 
get to bow before Juggernaut, and the Abyssinian no 
more shall pour out his libation to the genius of the 
Nile, but the enlightened devotions of a world shall 
ascend to the true God. Then shall the -'cap-stone" 



MASONIC ORATION". 93 

to the temple of human happiness "be brought forth 
with shouting and praise." 

In this great consummation, human means must 
be employed ; ours, therefore, is not the part of inac- 
tion and sloth ; we are not to be indulged in folded 
hands, and quiet sleep. However humble the effort, 
still that effort must be made — duty requires it, and 
her injunctions will not be disobeyed with impunity. 
If but one stone be prepared by each, it will con- 
tribute to the building, and rest assured, the laborer 
shall receive his reward. Let us then grasp the plwnh 
in one hand, and see that we stand erect before God 
ami man., while with the mystic troivel in the other, we 
spread everywhere the cement of brotherly love. Then, 
when we shall all be leveled by death, and tyled in the 
grand lodge of eternity; when the ^''imss-iDord^' shall 
be demanded for the last time, we may approach with 
some humble confidence, and say, (in the language 
of the pious sacrifices of the first-fruits,) "I have 
brought away the hallowed things out of mine house 
and have given them to the Levite and the stranger, 
unto the fatherless and the tvidoiv, according to all the 
commandments which thou hast commanded me, I 
have not transgressed thy commandments, neither 
have I forgotten them." 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 

[In the House of Representatives of the United States, Friday, 
April 4th, 1834. The order of the day, for the first hour, waa 
the consideration of the Resolution of Mr. Marsden, of Alabama, 
proposing that the public deposits should remain in the State 
Banks ; but that Congress should have the selection and regu- 
lation of the banks in which they are to be placed. On this 
subject, Mr. Corwin had the floor, and addressed the House until 
the expiration of the hour. On the next Friday (the 11th), the 
same question coming up as the unfinished "business of the first 
hour, he resumed and continued to the expiration of the hour; 
and on the following morning he concluded his remarks.] 

Mr. Speaker: 

I feel sensibly the very awkward and embarrass- 
ing relations that have subsisted between speakers 
and their audience in this House, during the last six 
weeks of this important and protracted discussion. 
He who has, at any time, been so fortunate as to 
obtain the floor, sees that he occupies a position 
which many others around him have sought with 
unavailing effect. Those around him, on the other 
hand, feel as if they had been dej)rived by another 
of a right which they all possess in common with 
him, while the daily threat of the majority to silence 
debate, by a call of the previous question, gives just 
cause to fear that the right of themselves, and those 
they represent, to be heard in this House, on subjects 
affecting deeply their interests, will be finally denied 
them. 

(94) 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 96 

I can not say, with the honorable gentleman from 
New Jersey [Mr. Dickerson], that I have been in- 
structed to speak on this subject ; yet I can assure 
the House that its manifest impatience of further 
discussion would induce me still to observe a silence 
which I have rigidly maintained for nearly three 
sessions of Congress, did I not feel myself impelled 
to a diiferent course by obligations which I can no 
longer disregard. My judgment does not approve, 
nor do my feelings participate in, that anxiety which 
has been expressed to bring this discussion to a close. 
It should not be matter of surprise to any one, that 
this subject has for three months engrossed the atten- 
tion of Congress, to the exclusion of almost every 
other. Its magnitude should exclude all precipita- 
tion when it is approached, and admonish us to delay 
and ponder well before we decide. It involves great 
principles, which all must see lie deep in the founda- 
tions of our political organization; it ranges over a 
vast field of constitutional law; it comprehends many 
of the most interesting rights of the citizen — rights 
which, until now, have always been supposed to be 
included within the unquestioned legislative powers 
of Congress. 

When we reflect that everything valuable to civil 
liberty, all those maxims of good government which 
are so happily combined in our written Constitutions, 
have been purchased at the expense of blood and 
revolutionary strife, or wrought out into their present 
shape through long ages of trial and painful expe- 
rience, common prudence should suggest great delib- 



96 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

eration in any attempt to destroy or re-adjust their 
established order. It should not be expected that 
the dearest rights of the citizen, and the most im- 
portant duties and powers of the legislator, are to be 
discussed here with that sort of inconsiderate haste 
which may be tolerated in matters of small or tem- 
porary concernment, but which true wisdom never 
indulges when we are dealing with those great inter- 
ests which come to us by inheritance from the past, 
which are the birthright of the present, and the best 
hope of future generations. 

I am sure I do not overrate the importance of this 
discussion. The deep excitement felt here, in minds 
habitually cool, temperate, and even phlegmatic, 
proves that 1 do not. The excitation of the public 
mind proves to you that I do not magnify its import- 
ance. Do we want proofs of this? Look abroad 
over this wide continent. Three months ago it was 
seen agitating the surface like the tremulous premo- 
nitions of the coming earthquake ; now it is rocking 
society to its foundations. The heavings of this 
fearful convulsion have torn from their accustomed 
walks and natural positions, and 2^1'ocipitated into 
one mass, in a neighboring city, forty thousand of 
our citizens, each calling upon the other for counsel 
and co-operation. From the populous cities on your 
Atlantic frontier, where the first ripple of discontent 
was seen, the wave has swollen until it burst like a 
deluge over the mountains, carrying discontent and 
alarm through the peaceful valleys of the great west, 
inhabited by the most patient, temperate, and quiet 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 97 

population anywhere to be found on the face of the 
earth. Ominous as this excitement may appear to 
some, I can not regret its existence. Though the 
storm that lowers upon our hitherto unclouded 
horizon be dark, I feel an assured confidence that 
its thunders, when they do burst, will roll to save, 
not to destroy. It gives cheering proof that the 
spirit of our fathers, that "augured misgovernment 
at a distance, and snuffed the approach of tyranny 
in every tainted gale," is not extinguished in the 
bosoms of their sons. 

In the notice I shall take of the causes that have 
produced such striking and interesting effects, I do 
not intend to fatigue the patience of gentlemen by 
any examination of the great elementary and con- 
stitutional principles which belong to this subject. 
These I shall consider as settled. Others, to whom 
I have listened w4th feelings of pride and delight 
which I can not soon forget, have left upon this part 
of the canvass their own bright and indelible im- 
pressions of reason and truth — impressions which 
any touch from my unpracticed hand could not 
illustrate ; but, on the contrary, would most cer- 
tainly obscure, if not efface. 

That which I propose to consider somewhat 
minutely, relates to a few simple propositions of 
law, arising out of the provisions of the act of 1816. 
These are subjects in themselves of narrow dimen- 
sions, and to most minds of dry and uninteresting- 
character. Cold and repulsive, however, as the sub- 
jects may be, it is from them, and out of them, that 
7 



98 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

a public agent of Congress has endeavored to extract 
a power so large and so pervading that its colossal 
form meets and blocks up the way of Congress, in 
whatever part of our allotted sphere we attempt to 
move. This spectral image of despotism, let it be 
remembered, rises from the tomb of the Bank of the 
United States. The same scepter, with one blow of 
which he levelled the bank in the dust, is at this 
moment stretched out to bar the approaches of Con- 
gress, either to the grave of his late victim, or to the 
treasury of the people, on which he has seized as his 
lawful prey. 

The resolution on your table, which is the imme- 
diate subject of discussion, proposes a total, radical 
change, or rather subversion, of our whole system of 
finance. That change, it will occur to all, can not 
be eifected unless Congress shall give its approval to 
the argument of the Secretary of the Treasury, 
giving his reasons for taking the first, and, as I fear, 
fatal, step in this new and untried experiment. That 
argument, it is contended, furnishes a legal justifica- 
tion to the Secretary for proceeding, at the will and 
under the direction of the President, to dismiss the 
Bank of the United States from our service as an 
agent to collect and disburse the revenue, and to 
withhold from it that revenue which, by law, was 
ordered to be deposited with the bank for safe keep- 
ing. After a careful, and, as I believe, unbiased 
attention to all that has been urged to sustain this 
proposition, I can not yield to it the assent of my 
understanding. 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 99 

A very cursory view of the groundwork of this 
discussion will disclose the necessity, in the tirst 
place, of a careful examination of the powers and 
duties of the Secretary of the Treasury, under the 
Constitution and general laws relating to that depart- 
ment. In settling the character, origin, and respon- 
sibilities of that officer, is developed that radical 
diiference of political faith and 2^i*^^ctice which 
divides the two parties in this House, and, in my 
judgment, constitutes the most striking feature of 
this discussion. 

On one side are arrayed the friends of " executive 
])ower." They contend that your Secretary of the 
Treasury is the mere offspring of executive will, and 
is the agent and instrument of the President; that 
he sustains this character, not only in the general 
duties assigned to him by law, but that such is his 
character in the relations between him and the bank ; 
that the discretion vested in the Secretary, by the 
sixteenth section of the bank charter, to withhold 
fi'om that institution "the public deposits, giving his 
reasons to Congress for so doing," is not his discre- 
tion, but that he must act in obedience to the discre- 
tion, will, and judgment of the President, in this as 
well as every other duty assigned him by law ; that 
he is responsible to the President only, and not to 
Congress, for the faithful execution of duties imposed . 
on him by Congress. In short, they invest the 
President with all the attributes and powers of a: 
superintending providence over all the concerns of 
the Government. It is not surprising, after having. 



100 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIJ^. 

found in our Constitution such a divinity, that those 
who worship at his shrine should hold all inferior 
beings (as all must be so) responsible to him, and 
him only, for their conduct. While they give to 
the President all the powers and attributes of a 
god, they withhold both from the Secretary, till 
they make him much less than man. They ad- 
mit the law has said that the deposits of the public 
moneys shall ybe made in the Bank of the United 
States, "unless the Secretary of the Treasury shall 
otherwise order and direct;" in which last case, he 
is to lay before Congress his reasons for such order 
and direction. Yet, they contend that, while it is 
the duty of the Secretary to do all these things, he 
can in none of them exercise his own faculties; he is 
to see through the President's eyes, reason through 
and by the President's understanding, decide by the 
President's will, and execute with the President's 
power. In other words, he is to be responsible with- 
out discretion, to reason without judgment, decide 
without will, and execute without power. 

On the other side of this question are to be found 
those who contend for the "power of the people," 
through their representatives, over the money of the 
people. We maintain that, in all things pertaining 
to the collection, safe-keeping, and disbursement of 
their taxes, which Congress, by the Constitution, has 
the exclusive power "to lay and collect," and which 
can only be paid out, when collected, by act of 
Congress, the Secretary receives his power to act 
from Congress, is the agent of Congress, and is 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 101 

responsible to Congress for the faithful execution 
of those powers intrusted to him by Congress. 

No one who has attended to the arguments in this 
House, and read the volumes of reports and executive 
documents sent here to enlighten us, can deny that I 
have stated truly the grounds assumed, in and out 
of Congress, by the conflicting parties on this subject. 
iThe very statement of the case is itself the best 
argument to show that gentlemen on the other side 
can not maintain the position they have assumed. 
Unless there be some reason hidden below the surface 
as yet, of all this discussion, which has, unperceived 
by all, wrought a mysterious conviction on the minds 
of gentlemen, there can be no difficulty in coming to 
a right decision of this question. I am fortified in 
this belief by the contradictory propositions assumed 
and defended in the report made to us by the com- 
mittee of Ways and Means. 

That committee, selected by the Chair for its 
financial abilities, and not by presumption, nor 
alw^ays in fact, the ablest expounders of the Constitu- 
tion, has, with great care, presented the House with 
a very elaborate view of the relative powers of 
Congress, and the President, and the Secretary of the 
Treasury, under the Constitution. 

It sets out with the assertion that the power to 
select the place of deposit, and the person or persons 
w^ho shall have the custody of the public moneys, 
always did, and does now, belong to the head of the 
Treasury, under the supervision and control of the 
Executive, The process of the argument is this: 



102 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

It is alleged (in the report alluded to) that this 
power, under the old confederation, was considered 
an executive power, and as such was exerted by 
Congress; that, when the confederation ga^-e place 
to the Constitution, "all executive power" (this 
being one) was transferred by the Constitution to 
the President, where, under that instrument, it still 
remains. The committee, with a degree of industry 
much more commendable than the discrimination bv 
which it seems to have been guided, in order to show 
the usage of former times to be conformable to theii' 
doctrines, have brought forward a variety of historical 
proofs and references. Mr. Speaker, it is no necessary 
part of my duty or purpose to controvert this posi- 
tion. However strange it may aj^i^ear, the Com- 
mittee have either abandoned or completely refuted 
it themselves, in the same report, where, with so 
much labor, they asserted and endeavored to establish 
it. jVeither am I bound to account for these candid 
inconsistencies. Perhaps the committee ma}' have 
thought it a kind of incumbent duty to maintain the 
dignity and honor of the Executive against the 
charge of usurpation. Having, however, discharged 
that duty, to which they felt themselves forced by 
the violent impulses of the occasion, with most 
amiable partiality for Constitutional truth and sound 
political philosophy, they abandoned this ground, and 
now assert the power of Congress, under the Consti- 
tution, to have been always (up to 1816,) complete 
over the public moneys, and acknowledge themselves 
at a loss to find any good reason why the Congress 



ox thp: public dp:posits. 103 

of 1816 should then have transferred it to other 
hands. I beg leave to refer gentlemen who have 
not looked critically at this report, to one or two 
paragraphs on the fifth page. From these it will be 
seen I have quoted them truly, and given to their 
language their own interpretation. 

In giving construction to the sixteenth section of 
the bank charter, passed by Congress in 1816, the 
committee say: "The eifect of the sixteenth section 
of the bank charter is to take from Congress entirely 
the power to control the public deposits, which that 
body before possessed." Again, on the same page, 
they say: "Whether the Congress acted wisely in thus 
divesting themselves of all control over the places 
of public deposit of the public moneys, for the long 
period of twenty years, is a question which it is 
unnecessary to determine." These quotations j^rove 
(if language is any sign of ideas) that the committee 
considered it undeniable truth, that, in 1816, Con- 
gress, by the Constitution, did possess legislative 
power over this subject, and that they divested them- 
selves of that power by the act of 1816. In the 
first pages of their report, however, they have 
bestowed much labor to prove that Congress never 
did possess this power; that, by the Constitution, it 
was confided to the President as the head of the 
Executive department, this being one of the executive 
powers which, by the adoption of the Constitution, 
was, among others, transferred to that officer. 

Let us pause at this point for a moment, while we 
examine the consequences, I can not say absurdities, 



104 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

(for that word, though one of "exceedingly good 
command" in our language, is not parliamentary,) 
which flow from the various positions maintained, 
and most of them in turn abandoned or refuted, in 
the committee's report. First, it is asserted that 
the power over the deposits of the public moneys 
by the Constitution (being an executive power) 
belongs to the President, who is to exercise it through 
his agent, the Secretary of the Treasury. It follows 
that this power, if given to the President, could not 
be exercised or controlled by Congress, unless the 
Constitution should be so changed as to give them 
such control, yet, in the succeeding pages of this 
same report, the committee find Congress in lawful 
possession of this power, but, as they insist, taking it 
away from themselves, and giving it to the Secretary 
of the Treasury, in the year 1816. If the first 
position be true, the second is certainly unfounded. 
Again, if the committee be right in the position that 
Congress in 1816, did possess complete control over 
the person who should keep, and the place where 
the public moneys should be kept, and if this power 
was given them by the Constitution, could Congress, 
at its pleasure, change the Constitution, and transfer 
that power to another? The committee seem to 
/ think they could. When the committee speak of 
Congress "divesting" itself of a power held under 
the Constitution, I can only understand them by 
supposing they take it for granted that Congress, at 
its pleasure, can, by law, transfer power from one 
branch of the Federal Government to another. This 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 105 

doctrine, sir, is new to me ; nor do I believe it has, 
as yet, obtained a very general credit with American 
statesmen. 

To this family of incongruities permit me, before 
I take my leave of them, to introduce a kindred 
fallacy of the Secretary of the Treasury. It will be 
found in what he calls his "reasons" for withhold' 
ing the public moneys from the Bank of the United 
States. It is this : he (the Secretary) asserts that 
the act of 1816, creating the bank, is unconstitu- 
tional. If so, it is inoperative, and can confer no 
rights upon the bank — no powers upon any one. It 
leaves every subject it touches as though no law had 
been attempted to be enacted. Yet the Secretary 
himself, and the committee, in their rej^ort, claim 
that this same act gives power to the Secretary of 
the Treasury to lay his hand upon the whole revenues 
of this nation, and transfer them to persons, and 
deposit them in places, not authorized or designated 
by law. Reason and law would tell us that if, as 
the committee argue. Congress rightfully possessed 
this power in 1816, and if, as the committee and 
Secretary both agree, the attempt to vest it else- 
where resulted in passing an act unconstitutional, 
and therefore void, then the power remained where 
it was — that is to say, in Congress, and not in the 
Secretary or the President; and the question may 
well be asked, by what law does the Secretary claim 
to possess himself of this high and transcendent 
power ? Mr. Speaker, when I look at this ludicrous 
jumble of contradictions, and remember that they 



106 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

are the joint product of the well-known, talented, 
and accomplished mind of the Secretary of the Trea- 
sury, and the not less richly-endowed intellect of the 
honorable chairman of the "Ways and Means," I 
see and acknowledge, in thankfulness of heart, the 
oi~>eration of one of those laws which Infinite Wisdom 
has established tor the government of the mind of 
man. Reason is given by God to man, to guide him 
with certainty in the way of truth. That way is 
always straight; it is plain and bright with the 
lights that ever burn around and along its borders. 
The path of error and sophistry is in the wilderness. 
Their course is mazy, devious, and shrouded in dark- 
ness. Whenever bias or passion, therefore, perverts 
the understanding from the uses to which it was 
ordained by him who gave it, as a penalty for its 
abuse, the wisdom of the wisest becomes folly ; and, 
that it may deceive no one, is involved in difficulties 
and contradictions, and ends in discomfiture and 
defeat. We have before us a case where this great 
moral truth is most strikingly exemplified. The 
Secretary of the Treasury, aided by the labors of 
the committee of "Ways and Means," with great 
toil and care, erects a costly, and magnificent, and 
heathenish anti-republican temple. They cover its 
walls all over with inscriptions of monarchical 
dogmas and barbaric phrases, alien to the dialects 
of democracy, and not written in the republican 
"books of the law" delivered to us by our fathers. 
With equal toil and pains they then construct a 
monstrous Juggernaut, and engrave upon his frontlet 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 107 

the magic words, " Executive Power." Him they 
enshrine with all the pomp of heathen idolatry. 
This done, they point to their idol, and command us 
to "fall down and worship." Suddenly, however, 
the scene changes. While we stand wrapped in 
amazement at the vast dimensions of the structure, 
the builders of it themselves, impelled by a law of 
their nature, assault it with violence, and in a twink- 
ling all is gone. The gorgeous temple, huge divinity, 
and costly shrine are leveled together in the dust. 

I dismiss this topic. Its singular character has, 
I find, tempted me to pursue it much further than I 
had intended. I take it for granted, then, that we 
have established, by the admissions of the devotees 
of executive power themselves, that all power o^er 
the money of the people belongs to the people, 
through their representatives in Congress ; that it 
belongs immediately to Congress, who alone have 
power to "lay and collect taxes." 

It follows, as a necessary consequence, that what- 
ever act the Secretary of the Treasury may do touch- 
ing those "taxes," he must do it by virtue of some 
power derived from Congress. It follows, with equal 
certainty, that, being the agent of Congress, he is 
responsible to Congress, from whom he receives his 
power, for its faithful and intelligent execution. 

Let us now turn to the commission given by Con- 
gress to the Secretary, touching the public moneys. 
It will be found in the 16th section of the bank 
charter of 1816, in these words : " The deposits of 
the moneys of the United States, in places in which 



y 



108 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the said bank and branches thereof may be estab- 
lished, shall be made in the said bank or branches 
thereof, unless the Secretary of the Treasury shall 
at any time otherwise order and direct; in which 
ease the Secretary of the Treasury shall immediately 
lay before Congress, if in session, and if not, imme- 
diately after the commencement of the next session,, 
the reasons of such order and direction." No one 
can doubt the character or object of the power here 
given. It is, in its character, a trust or discretionary 
power. Its objects were, first, the safety of the 
public treasure ; secondly, it was intended to compel 
the bank to a faithful performance of its promise, to 
transmit without charge the moneys of the govern- 
ment to the places where they were required to be 
disbursed. If the bank should fail in either of these 
stipulations. Congress intended that the Secretary 
should have the power to find immediately other 
places of deposit, and other disbursing agents. To 
enable the Secretary to discharge the delicate trust 
thus reposed in him. Congress provides, in the same 
law, "that the officer at the head of the Treasury 
department of the United States shall be furnished, 
from time to time, as often as he may require, not 
exceeding once a week, with statements of the amount 
of the capital stock of the said corporation, and of 
the debts due to the same ; of the moneys deposited 
therein ; of the notes in circulation ; and of the 
specie in hand ; and shall have a right to inspect 
such general accounts on the books of the bank as 
shall relate to the said statement: Provided, that 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 109 

this shall not be construed to imply a right of 
inspecting the account of any private individual or 
individuals with the bank." 

The last paragraph of this act contains an answer 
to every reason urged by the Secretary for removing 
the deposits from the Bank of the United States. It 
shows to what objects Congress designed to confine 
the power given to that officer over the public funds. 
All that the Secretary can know, from what the bank 
is bound to disclose to him in the weekly statement 
required to be furnished, relates to the solvency of 
the bank. It was intended to furnish the Secretary 
in this way, with the means of executing the power 
given him, to protect the safety of the people's money. 
It will be observed that the Secretary is, in express 
words, denied the right to look into the "private 
accounts of individuals." With what pretense of 
plausibility can it be contended, as it has been by the 
Secretary and President too, that improper accounts 
between the bank and certain printers, which can 
only be known by examining the " private accounts," 
form a reason or answer for the exercise of this 
power? The construction contended for by those 
who defend the Executive, would make the CongTess 
of 1816 confer, by law, large powers on their agent ; 
and, in the same law, expressly deny him the power 
to ascertain those facts upon which alone he would 
be justified in using the power conferred. That Con- 
gress never intended to extend the power of the Sec- 
retary over the vast field of inquiry which, in the all- 
grasping spirit of the executive government, he has 



110 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

appropriated, is also evident, from the powers over 
the bank, reserved to Congress, compared with those 
given and denied to the Secretary, to which last I 
have j list adverted. By the 23d section of the char- 
ter, it is provided "that it shall at all times be lawful 
for a committee of either House of Congress, appointed 
for that purpose, to inspect the books and to examine 
into the proceedings of the corporation hereby cre- 
ated, and to report whether the provisions of this 
charter have been, by the same, violated or not." It 
then goes on to provide (in the event of a report by 
the committee of a violation of the charter) that a 
scire facias shall issue from the circuit court of the 
United states, calling on the bank to show cause, etc. 
A jury of the country, sworn and impanneled to try 
the cause, would then be the tribunal to which the 
subject would be referred for decision. But this good 
old usage of our fathers did not comport with that 
scheme of compendious confiscation which had been 
resolved on. 

We have here, on the face of the law, the duties 
and powers required to be done and exercised by the 
Secretary, and the subjects of inquiry which Congress 
reserved to itself, and the courts and juries of the 
country. But the Secretary, with this law before 
liim, backed or pushed forward by the President, 
takes all the powers of Congress and the courts into 
his own hand, and gravely tells Congress that, by the 
law I have just quoted, he (whenever, in his opinion, 
"the public good or convenience required it,") could 
dismiss the bank as a depository of the public money. 



ON THE rUBLIC DEPOSITS. Ill 

and dissolve all connection of the Government with 
that institution. In effect, he assumes, with a bold- 
ness unparalleled in any officer in a country of laws, 
to exercise executive, legislative and judicial powers ; 
to forfeit charters, held under the pledged faith of the 
nation ; to seize upon rights guaranteed by all the 
solemnities of legislative enactment, and fortified by 
all the strength of legislative power. 

Let us examine this modest assumption of the Sec- 
retary by another test. He insists that his power to 
dissolve all connection with the United States Bank 
is unlimited, except "by his own discretion." If, 
then, in his opinion, the bank was dangerous as a 
monopoly (for this is much insisted on) ; if it did not 
furnish a good currency ; if State banks would be, in 
his opinion, more safe or convenient depositories of 
the public moneys ; if the tendencies of the institu- 
tion, in his or the President's opinion, would be 
unfriendly to the morals of the people ; then, in either 
of these cases, the Secretary of the Treasury could, 
of his own proper authority, under the act of 1816, as 
to all public purposes, repeal the law itself. Sir, is 
this to be tolerated ? Were the men who composed 
the Congress of 1816 such miserable drivelers as 
this interpretation of their acts would make them ? 
What ol)ject had they in view, in erecting the United 
States Bank? Is any American citizen, who can 
read, so ignorant as not to know them ? The Gov- 
ernment had lost by State banks about fourteen 
hundred thousand dollars. It determined to create 
a bank, as a place of safe-keeping of the people's 



112 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

money, which it could examine into and control, in 
order to prevent future loss. The arguments for and 
against this institution were heard for three years in 
this hall, prior to the final passage of the bank char- 
ter — its dangerous tendencies as a moneyed monop- 
oly ; its power over the politics of the country : the 
effect it would have on currency, trade and exchange ; 
all were debated with zeal and ability, which would 
have illustrated the history of any deliberative body 
that ever yet assembled anywhere upon earth. These 
various points of policy were all settled by Congress, 
the only power in a representative government which 
can take cognizance of such subjects. The act was 
passed ; it received the President's approval ; it be- 
came a law, for twenty years. Now, the President 
and Secretary assert that this same Congress, by a 
clause in this same act, authorized the Secretary of 
the Treasury to sit down and examine whether Con- 
gress had acted wisely or not ; whether a bank was a 
dangerous engine against liberty; whether it would 
or would not 1 )e likely to exert a beneficial and whole- 
some influence upon trade and domestic or foreign 
exchange. If, on reflection, he should be of opinion 
that the public treasure could be more securely kept 
and transmitted from place to place by the State 
banks ; or if he, in any of these particulars, relating 
to public policy, should differ with both branches of 
Congress and the President, he (the Secretary) should 
in that case repeal the law. Yes, sir, repeal the law. 
For the whole object of the bank charter was to make 
the bank created by it an agent of the Government. 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 113 

To give the Secretary a power to destroy that agency, 
for any reason of a moral or political character, was, 
in substance, giving him a power to repeal and annul 
the whole law. Courtesy forbids me the use of terms 
proper to convey my ideas of such miserable incon- 
sistency as this. This course of argument makes the 
Congress of the United States, after years of anxious 
labor, on a subject of vital interest to the nation, 
throw together, in the shape of law, not a well- 
ordered system of finance, reaching, as all systems 
worth anything must do, forward with certain and 
steady operation into the future; no, instead of this, 
you make them heap together a disjointed jumble of 
crude conceptions and self-evident contradictions ; 
and then, in impotent despair, call upon the wisdom, 
and virtue, and skill of a Secretary of the Treasury 
to review their policy, and make or destroy their law 
at his pleasure. And this is called republican doc- 
trine. This is modern democracy ! This is said to be 
the way of keeping power in the hands of the peoi^le, 
*'the many," and denying sovereign sway to the few, 
or to one. 

Let us now turn to that view of the subject which 
regards the various provisions of the bank charter in 
the light of a contract. 

I am sure it needs no argument to prove to this 
House that a law which coiifers upon one or more 
persons certain rights, and imposes on them certain 
duties to be performed, on the faith of which such 
persons invest their money, is, in its terms and 
nature, a compact. As such, for the term of its 
8 



114 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

duration, all power given under it is irrevocable ; as 
a law, it is not capable of repeal : as a contract, ex- 
cept in the mode pointed out bv its provisions, it is 
indissoluble. 

The bank charter of 1816 proposes to all who 
would subscribe stock under its provisions, that they 
should possess the corporate powers specified in that 
act for the full term of twenty years. The stock- 
holders, on their part, agree to pay to the United 
States a bonus of one million and a half of dollars; 
to receive and keep safe, at their own risk, the 
revenues of the Government; to transmit at their 
own risk, and without charge, the moneys of the 
Government to any point required for disbursement. 
In consideration of these arduous and responsible 
duties, and the pa^Tnent of the bonus, the Govern- 
ment agrees, on its part, that the stockholders shall 
have the right to issue their notes, which shall be 
received in pa^Tiient of all public dues, unless Con- 
gress shall othei'wise direct by law. The bank shall 
have the benefit of the deposit of the public moneys 
during the term of twenty years, unless the Secretary 
of the Treasury shall otherwise order and direct, for 
reasons which shall be approved (as I construe the 
law) by both branches of Congress. These are, in 
substance, the mutual solemn engagements between 
the Government of the United States and the stock- 
holders of the United States Bank. I think it has 
been satisfactorily shown that the only reasons upon 
which the Secretary could remote the public moneys 
from the bank are, first, that they were unsafe in its 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 115 

custody; or. secondly, that the bank had failed or 
refused to transmit and pay them over as required 
by law. It is not pretended that our revenues are 
in danger of being lost by the insolvency of the 
liank, nor am I aware that it has been suggested in 
debate that the bank has been delinquent in its 
engagements to transmit and pay them over at any 
point where the Government has had occasion to 
disburse them. The withdrawal from the bank of 
the deposits has. then, been made without any cause 
such as was contemplated by the charter, and, con- 
sequently, in violation of the contract between the 
Government and the stockholders of the bank. 
^^^lat is the position we occupy in the face of our 
country and the world? We have pledged the faith 
and honor of the nation ; upon which pledge twenty- 
eight millions of money have been invested in a 
bank in which we are parties. Without any reason 
applicable to our contract, we have wantonly violated 
one of its vital and most essential stipulations. 
Fully sensible of the degrading and loathsome char- 
acter of the act we are considering. Avhen A'iewed as 
a violation of contract, the sensitive and generous 
mind of the gentleman fi'om Georgia. [Mr. Gilmer,] 
as also that of his colleague, [Mr. Schley.] have 
labored to rid the charter of all the attributes of a 
compact. They seem to suppose it absurd to imagine 
that a contract could be made binding in this in- 
stance, because one of the parties is a "corporation." 
Many of their remarks on this part of the subject 
resolve themselves into those quaijit definitions of 



116 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

the qualities and faculties of a corporation in the old 
law books that treat of these subjects. Among other 
things it is said, that a corporation has no soul. Sir, 
there is black-letter authority enough for that. But 
the gentleman should have done justice to the ancient 
luminaries of the law, and told, further, that they 
only intended to say that a corporation, as such, 
could not commit a crime, and in its corporate 
capacity could not be punished as a criminal. Will 
gentlemen contend from this that no binding contract 
can be made with any number of persons who are 
thus incorporated? Does it follow that the various 
individuals who compose this artificial person with- 
out a soul, can, in its corporate character, have no 
civil rights? This course of argument would seem 
to affirm that a great nation, a proud republic, could 
pledge its faith to the performance of certain acts to 
a corporation which itself had created, and in good 
faith, without tarnishing its honor, at any time, 
refuse to redeem its pledge, and allege, as a justifi- 
cation, the ready plea, "you are a corporation — you 
have no soul." Excellent jurisprudence! admirable 
ethics! most amiable philosophy! What a figure 
such a chapter would have made in the profound 
and eloquent volumes of Hooker! what luster it 
would have shed upon the morality of Paley! It 
certainly never occurred to the great teachers of law 
or ethics that, because a corporation could not, as 
such, commit murder, nor yet itself be subject to 
that crime, therefore, it followed, from reason, irre- 
fragable, that it was lawful and right to rob it; that, 



O^ THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 117 

as it could not in its corporate character commit a 
crime, and would, therefore, escape punishment in 
the next world, reason, equity, and the eternal fitness 
of things, required that it should be visited with con- 
fiscation in this. Of a character closely allied to' 
this, in its moral tendency, is that class of arguments 
which treats the contract, in the bank charter, as a 
•jiromise liable to be performed or broken, according 
to the fluctuating opinions of those who might hold, 
for the time being, the political power necessary to 
its faithful execution. Is this the light in which 
modern morality and law have taught us to consider 
national obligations and national honor? Does a 
change of power from one political party to those of 
another political faith absolve the latter from all 
obligations contracted by the former? Sir, within 
the last four years, the long-exiled Bourbon has paid 
us for spoliations committed on our commerce by 
revolutionary France. The present King of Naples 
has renumerated our citizens for injuries sustained 
by them at the hands of Joachim Murat. Such, sir, 
is the universal law of good faith which descends 
and attaches upon all who, in the process of time, 
however remote, succeed to the political power of 
Government. 

It is this faith-keeping principle in States and in- 
dividuals that holds together the moral elements of 
the world. It is superior to, and controls, all human 
will. Its obligations are paramount to all human 
control. It is a law of perpetual obligation, from 
which neither States nor individuals can absolve 



118 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

themselves ; it is felt in the hearts of men ; it does 
not derive its origin from society; it is the parent 
and origin of all social existence ; it is the principle 
of the honest man, the honor of the gentleman, the 
chivalry of the brave man, the piety of the good 
man, the glory of a nation. 

Mr. Speaker, if this act of the Secretary is in itself 
wrong, being founded in palpable injustice toward 
the bank, it is not less condemnable as being un- 
wise and inexpedient as a measure of public policy. 
Though I by no means admit that wliat the Sec- 
retary calls " his reasons " are, in a single instance, 
such as to form even an apology for his conduct, 
yet it is only respectful toward him to bestow a 
passing notice upon some of them. He sets out with 
the declaration that the people of the United States 
had declared that the charter 'of the present bank 
should not be renewed. This is put forward as the 
basis upon which he felt himself compelled to act. 
In a matter aifecting, in the tenderest point, the 
interest and business and property of a nation, we 
should expect, from ordinary prudence, great cer- 
tainty in ascertaining facts, necessary to be known, 
before consequences so momentous were encountered. 
The evidence of the existence of such facts should 
not be conjectural or equivocal, but such as could 
leave no doubt — such as would extort conviction 
from the mind. What, then, was this proof, think 
you, of a decision by the people that the bank should 
cease to exist ? It was this : General Jackson was 
re-elected to the presidency in November, 1832, and 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 119 

he was not a friend of the bank ! Here is the direct, 
positive, overwhehning evidence of the sense of a 
nation, as the Secretary supposes, on a simple iso- 
lated question concerning the renewal of a charter. 
What a compliment to the President! He is, by 
this view of the election, represented as being chosen 
to preside over the republic, not for his profound 
knowledge of civil polity, in all its complex and 
multiform ramifications ; not for his acquaintance 
with our diplomatic history; not for his large and 
comprehensive views of the rising and future des- 
tinies of tliis flourishing republic; not for his great 
renown in arts or arms : no, none of these. He was, 
according to the view of it, clothed with the highest 
honor mortal man can -confer, simply and only 
because he did not like a certain corporation in 
the city of Philadelphia, of which one Nicholas 
Biddle was the president. Sir, I can find a hundred 
men at work on the canal about this city, before 
sunset, that have the same qualification for the high 
office of chief magistrate of the republic, if oppo- 
sition to a banking corporation is to be the sole nml 
exclusive test of merit. The people of this country 
will no longer be fit to be trusted with the election 
of their President, when they make that election 
turn upon a single supposed opinion of their candi- 
date touching one only of the great variety of sub- 
jects upon which that officer is obliged to act. For 
the reputation of the President, for the character of 
my countrymen, I tru^ this opinion expressed by 
the Secretary, smd m another document asserted bj 



120 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the President himself, will be repudiated by this 
House. I know it will be rejected with indignation 
by the enlightened freemen of the country as a re- 
flection upon their intelligence. 

But, sir, I deny that the President ever expressed 
to the people an imqualijied declaration against the 
renewal of the charter of the United States Bank, 
I know that he refused his approval to the bill for 
that purpose j^assed in 1832 ; but do we not all know 
that, among other things, in his message to Congress 
on that subject, the President distinctly asserts the 
power of Congress to create a bank, and plainly 
intimates his willingness to aid them in doing so. 
Let his own language speak for him : " That a Bank 
of the United States, competent to all the duties 
which may be required by the government, might 
be so organized as not to infi^inge on our own dele- 
gated powers, or the reserved rights of the States^ 
/ do not entertam a douht. Had the Executive been 
called upon to furnish the project of such an institu- 
tion, the duty would have been cheerfully performed. 
In the absence of such a call, it is obviously proper 
that he should confine himself to pointing out those 
prominent features in the act presented,, which, in 
his opinion, make it incompatible with the Constitu- 
tion and sound policy." Here we have a distinct 
annuncicition, by the President, that a bank might 
be created which would answer all public purposes ; 
of this, he says, he "does not entertain a doubt," 
and that, if called upon, he would cheerfully furnish 
the project of such an institution. This, sir, in that 



ox THE rUBLIC DEPOSITS. 121 

portion of the country within the range of my imme- 
diate observation, was seized upon by the President's 
friends, at his hist election, to show that he woukl yet 
furnish to the country a bank. He, and he alone, it 
would seem, had made the discovery of some project 
concerning currency and treasury agency, which the 
wisdom of the wisest, for the last fifty years, had 
sought for in vain. The country has patiently waited 
the redemption of this pledge for two years. Still 
some of his friends cry, "Patience, it will yet be 
brought forth." Great mystery is aifected, and no 
one ventures to say j^recisely what it will resemble ; 
yet still it will be, it is said, when it does come, just 
what all desire. Deep in the recesses of executive 
wisdom, they tell us, this grand secret is hidden. 
That which escaped the anxious search of Wash- 
ington, Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson, and all the 
Secretaries of the Treasury, for forty years, had 
been discovered by the present chief magistrate, and 
surely it would not be withheld from the world. It 
was suddenly to spring from the pregnant head of 
the Executive, like another Minerva from the head 
of Jove — the impersonation of wisdom armed from 
head to foot, covered all over with the panoply of 
the Constitution, graced with all the amiable facilities 
of bank credit and sound currency, and endowed, in 
an especial manner, with the energies and security 
of a proper treasury agent. This, sir, is what was 
decided upon by the people in the election of the 
President ; this was what they were promised ; they 
relied on that promise. Sir, it had that quality 



122 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

which always commends itself to our credence ; to 
say the least of it, it was modest! 

Two years have elapsed, and the expecting world 
still waits in hope of the grand development. 
Whether we are to die "without the sight," is 
among those future events which the curtain of 
time (perhaps fortunately for us) still conceals from 
mortal scrutiny. I take it for granted, that the 
rickety, misshapen imp, lately born of a forbidden 
concubinage between executive assumption and State 
bank prostitution, which we now see mewling and 
puking in the nursing arms of the committee of 
Ways and Means, is not to be palmed upon us for 
that '■'■ cava Demn soholes,''^ that ^'•magnum Jovis incre- 
menimni^'' which the world has so long been promised. 

Mr. Speaker, let us examine some other of our 
recollections of subjects agitated, and, by presump- 
tion, supposed to have been decided by the people in 
the election of President. Prior to the election of 
1829, nothing, touching the opinions of the candi- 
dates, formed a more decisive test, in the Western 
States, than the "taritf and internal improvement." So 
anxious were the people of that section of the country 
to be well informed on this subject, that the Legis- 
lature of Indiana authorized their Grovernor to open 
a correspondence with General Jackson, then a can- 
didate, in order to have record proof of his principles 
touching the measures to which I have referred. 
What followed ? In a reply to the Governor, a letter 
addressed to a gentleman in the South, and votes 
given in the other branch of Congress, were referred 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. • 123 

to ; but nothing explicit beyond these could be 
learned. This, however, was received by the good' 
natured people of Indiana as full proof of the Gen- 
eral's friendship to a protective system of duties, and 
liberal expenditure of public money upon roads and 
canals. Now, sir, if we can trust at all the news- 
papers of that day, we know that this same letter 
and these Senatorial votes were referred to in the 
South as furnishing very satisfactory evidence of the 
same gentleman's hostility to both tariff and internal 
improvement. 

With these examples of the dubious character of 
any evidence of public will, derived from the agita- 
tion of any subject in elections, we should have 
expected the highly-cultivated legal mind of the Sec- 
retary to hesitate in receiving that sort of proof as 
satisftictory, in any manner involving deeply the 
public interest. Our astonishment increases when 
we hear the President himself, with all the facts to 
which I have adverted fresh in his memory, make 
the declaration that his election, in 1832, is to be 
received as a decision of the people that the bank is 
not to be re-chartered. Another reason, as it is called, 
much insisted on, is equally without foundation in 
fact. It is amusing, if not vexatious, to observe the 
freedom with which both the Secretary and the com- 
mittee of Ways and Means draw upon the credulity 
of Congress and the people. They propose to destroy 
the United States Bank, and employ as treasury 
agents some hundreds of State banks throughout the 
Union, for the purpose — (mark the object in view !) 



124 -SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

for the purpose of "bringing back the currency where 
the sages who formed the Constitution found and left 
it." Where did the much-abused and misrepresented 
sages who formed the Constitution find the currency ? 
The mists of antiquity have not yet settled down 
upon the period referred to so heavily as to obscure 
from our vision the men and the deeds of that day., 
They found the currency made up of "continental 
money" and "bills of credit," issued by the several 
States of the then confederacy. Is this, then, the 
kind of currency which the patriots and philan- 
thropists of the present day intend to give us? 
Where, again I ask, did the sages who formed the 
Constitution leave the currency ? Let us look some- 
what minutely into this portion of our history. I 
shall l)c willing to go with gentlemen in any measure 
which will give us just such a currency as the sages 
who formed the Constitution left us. The convention 
that formed the Constitution was composed of thirty- 
nine members, including General Washington, its 
presiding officer. Of the thirty-eight members who 
signed the Constitution in 1787, sixteen were mem- 
bers of Congress under the Constitution, in the year 
1791, when the first United States Bank was char- 
tered ; twelve of these sixteen voted for that bank, 
and four against it. Among those who voted against 
it w^as Mr. Madison, who, afterward, in 1816, yielded 
his objections, and approved the charter of the 
present bank. General W^ashington, in 1791, was 
President of the United States, and approved the 
establishment of the bank. General Hamilton was 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 125 

then Secretary of the Treasury, and recommended it. 
Here, then, we have the recorded opinions of eigh- 
teen of the thirty-nine who signed the Constitution ; 
fifteen of these were in favor of the Bank of the 
United States, and three against it. But, sir, this is 
not all. We are informed by those still living, who 
knew well the opinions of those other sages who 
formed the Constitution, who were not in the Con- 
gress of 1791, that seventeen of them were in ftivor 
of the Bank of the United States, as then established. 
The opinions of those who formed the Constitution, as 
to currency, would then stand thus : thirty -two in 
favor of a Bank of the United States, and seven 
against it. It was a currency, regulated, controlled 
and created by the Bank of the United States, which 
the sages who formed the Constitution "left us." 
From the year 1791 to the present hour, more than 
forty years, excepting four years of derangement, dis- 
aster and ruin, (from 1811 to 1816, when we had no 
United States Bank) we have had that currency; and 
now we are told, with apparent candor, too, that by 
abolishing the Bank of the United States, and giving 
to one hundred State banks twenty millions of public 
money, annually, to issue bank-notes upon, we shall 
bring back such a currency as the sages of 1791 gave 
us ; that we shall, in this way, restore the currency 
to the condition in which the immortal authors of the 
Constitution left it. I have neither time nor temper 
to animadvert further upon this attempt to bolster 
up the miserable schemes and shifts of this day, dig- 
nified with the name of plans, by authorities drawn 



126 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

from the earlier portion of our constitutional history. 
It can only succeed by mistaking the authority, or 
l)y a gross misunderstanding of historical facts. 

When we shall have broken up the present system 
of things, what does the Secretary, what do the com- 
mittee, propose to give us in its stead? Shall we 
liave a better circulating medium? They propose 
to give us, instead of United States Bank bills, the 
notes of State banks. More than four hundred of 
these now exist in the different States. Their notes 
are selling at the brokers' offices, in different parts 
of the Union, at a discount varying from two to ten 
per cent., at this moment. Two years ago, when war 
was declared against the present Bank of the United 
States, we were told that all banks were to be put 
down. They were all then monopolies, dangerous to 
liberty; and the destruction of paper currency and 
the restoration of coin were then begun. This was 
then the confident assertion of a portion of the party 
now in power. Let the history of that party, in the 
Legislatures of the States, since that time, speak for 
itself. In Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana, what has 
it done? Why, sir, in order to banish bank paper 
and restore coin, they commenced a clamor for State 
l)anks; and in my own State have, since 1832, incor- 
porated four millions of State bank capital! This 
has been done by that very party who are to bring 
back gold and silver currency by destroying banks! 
The same scene has been acted, by the same class of 
politicians, in all the Western States. It is now a 
well-known fact, that, since the message of the Pres- 



OTs^ THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 127 

ident was promulgated, putting his veto on the 
United States Bank charter of 1832, more than forty 
millions of bank capital have been incorporated in 
the different States in the Union. Such is the 
progress already made toward restoring gold and 
sih^r currency. I venture now the prediction, that, 
if the United States Bank, or some similar institu- 
tion, be not established, you will, before the lapse of 
five years, see twice the number of State banks now 
in existence. Their notes will be flying everywhere, 
thick as the leaves of the forest in an autumnal 
hurricane, and about as valuable. 

But suppose your league of Treasuiy banks should 
succeed in establishing their credit so as to give gen- 
eral currency to their paper; will not those banks, in 
that way, by loans and exchanges, gain the same 
powder and control over the business and trade of the 
country, wdiich, you say, is now possessed by the 
United States Bank — that dangerous power, for the 
possession of which, you say, it must be abolished? 
And what is gained by exchanging the one for the 
other? What will your condition be, when your 
league banks shall be able to crush, if they choose, 
the trade of the country? Can you strike them out 
of existence? Xo ! over them or their charters you 
have no control. The State Legislatures gave them 
life, and will, at their pleasure, prolong their exis- 
tence. Suppose their charters expire ; they are your 
Treasury agents ; they will then be indispensable to 
your system of finance. Will they consent to expire! 
Will not the stockholders in them be just as anxious 



128 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

for a renewal of their charters, as the owners of stock 
in the United States Bank now are for a renewal of 
theirs? Yes, sir, they will, and they will be just as 
little scrupulous about the means employed to obtain 
their end. This image with a hundred heads, which 
you are now erecting, will be just as difficult to de- 
stroy, as the monster you profess so much to fear. 
The impure priesthood of Mammon will clamor just 
as loudly for their hundred-headed idol god, as do 
those now whom you profess to regard with so much 
horror. You will find, when the discovery will be 
too late, that possessing stock in a State bank does 
not of itself make a Cato, nor owning the same prop- 
erty in the United States Bank convert a good citizen 
into a Cataline. 

There is another view of the dangerous connection 
between the Executive Government here and the 
banks of the States, which I can not pass without 
notice. If your scheme ever does succeed, if it 
works well in your fiscal affairs at all, it will ctf 
course be desirable to continue it in steady operation 
for a long time to come. But there will be obstacles 
to this. The charters of some of your banks will 
terminate. The Secretary of the Treasury will, of 
course, desire to have these charters renewed by the 
Leo'islatures of the States in which thev are situated. 
To efifect this, the influence of the l^ank will be first 
exerted on the Treasury department here, by offering 
to do your business on very advantageous terms ; the 
Secretary of the Treasury, with the aid of the power, 
popularity, and influence of the President for the 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 129 

time being, will bear down upon your State Legisla- 
tures; one vote, or two, or three, may, perhaps, 
decide the fate of your bank. Will not those votes 
be secured? Yes, the whole patronage of the Fed- 
eral Government in this scheme, from time to time, 
will be tempted into the Legislative halls of the 
States. We have heard much of consolidation ; much 
of the danger of merging the independence of the 
States in the overwhelming power of the Federal 
(xovernment. If the wit of man were tasked to 
invent a cunning, insidious plan, by which this ruin 
might be wrought, he could not devise one more 
likely to etfect his diabolical purpose than that pro- 
posed in this treasury invention. Give the Executive 
the powder to confer favors on so many diiferent com- 
panies of men, who also stand closely connected with 
the State Governments, and you have so many 
centripetal forces, drawing, by the resistless influence 
of pecuniary interest, the indej^endence of the States 
into the vortex of federal control. These twenty^ 
four stars, that now shine with such mild and pure 
luster, will be drawn from their spheres, and their 
lights quenched forever in the superior blaze of one 
great central sun. 

If these consequences do not come upon us, it 
will be because the States will not suffer themselves 
to be beguiled into your Treasury snare. Judging 
from what has already transpired, we may hope the 
good sense and patriotism of the States in this, as in 
other instances, may yet preserve this great con- 
federacy from the fatal effects of a mad and ruinous 
9 



130 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWINi 

policy. Three States have already refused to enter 
into this unholy alliance. Virginia, ever watchful 
of the approaches of federal usurpation, permitted 
your Treasury to sojourn a few weeks with her 
citizens ; but, finding you had sent a foul leprosy into 
her borders, although justly renowned for her hospi- 
tality, ordered her peoj^le to shut their doors upon 
you, and it was done. Kentucky, not less famed for 
the generous confidence she extends to strangers that 
come to her — Kentucky, who has a ready welcome 
for every friend, and a grave for every foe — she, too, 
tried your society for a brief space ; and, finding her 
health poisoned by your pestiferous touch, drove you 
back into your own territories. Pennsylvania, too, 
meek, temperate, and forbearing as was the spirit of 
her illustrious founder — she who receives the com- 
fortless and distressed of every kindred, caste, and 
clime under heaven, who cherishes all that take 
refuge in the ever-expanded arms of her comprehen- 
sive urbanity — ^good old Pennsylvania, who, like that 
divine charity spoken of by the apostle, "vaunteth 
not herself, is not puffed up, hopeth all things, 
believeth all things;" she, too, finding only bank- 
ruptcy, poverty, and want, in your society, yielded 
reluctantly to stern necessity, and pronounced the 
doom of banishment upon you. Happy experiment! 
profound policy! what admirable contrivance in the 
plan! what perfect order, harmony, and success in 
its execution! How proud is the condition of your 
Treasury under the influence of this grand experi- 
ment! With a certificate of good character in its 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 131 

hand, signed by the chief magistrate of the nation, 
it is driven forth from Virginia, banished from Ken- 
tucky, exiled from Pennsylvania. It is, at this 
moment, a wandering mendicant, begging in vain 
for a place whereon to rest the soles of its weary 
feet; like the hapless son of Hagar, driven forth 
from the patriarchal roof, and if report be true, his 
"bread" quite gone, and his "bottle of water" well 
nigh expended. If you permit him to remain much 
longer upon the desert, like Ishmael, he will be 
compelled to sustain a wandering and precarious 
existence by rapine and plunder. He will "turn his 
hand against every man," and "every honest man's 
hand will be turned against him." 

Is there an American bosom that is not pained, 
with mingled shame and indignation, at the present 
degraded condition of our country ? What ultimate 
or present good is to result from what has been 
done? None, no, none; but evil — only continual 
disaster, ^\^lat else can we expect? Perfidy in 
the Government will result, as it ought, in poverty 
to the people. We have not even the common 
motive of the felon : we could not be said to have 
acted in this instance from the love of gain. In the 
mere wanton or malignant consciousness of jDower, 
we have stained the national honor, violated national 
faith; we have taught the people to disobey the 
injunctions of law, by permitting an unchecked 
example of its violation by that very power whose 
ordained duty it is to maintain and enforce it. Let 
us not deceive ourselves. Let us not flatter each 



132 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

other with the expectation that this will be a solitary 
instance of Executive encroachment. No, history 
teaches us other lessons. That power that can sub- 
vert ancient usages, break with impunity national 
compacts, efface at will written laws, uj^root the lirm 
foundations of the Constitution, that power, if not 
suddenly arrested, will survive all that it destroys, 
and maintain itself in absolute dominion, by those 
very arts and instruments through which it required 
its first momentum. 

" 'T is but the same rehearsal of the past, 
First freedom, and then — glory; when that fails, 
Wealth, vice, corruption — barbarism at last."* 

When we review the history of the last few 
months, and see the strange mixture of confusion 
and systematic effort, all tending to bring upon the 
people lasting injury, and are told that all this must 
be borne, because "the people themselves willed it 
should be so," I can not but remind the Executive 
Government, and gentlemen here, of instances in 
which they have disregarded that will, when it was 
fully and fairly understood. 

Prior to the presidential election in 1828, the 
present chief magistrate, then a Senator in Congress 
from Tennessee, in his letter of resignation to the 
Tennessee Legislature, held the following excellent 

* As if to verify this prediction, in a few days after these 
remarks were made in the House, the President sent his cele- 
brated protest to the Senate, claiming for himself just enough 
power to carry into effect "his will," be that what it may. 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 133 

doctrines. Speaking of a contemplated alteration of 
the Constitution, he says: "I would impose a pro- 
vision rendering any member of Congress ineligible 
to office under the General Government during the 
term for which he was elected, and for two years 
thereafter. But if this change in the Constitution 
shall not be made, and important appointments con- 
tinue to devolve on the Representatives in Congress, 
it requires no depth of thought to be convinced that 
corruption will become the order of the day, and 
that, under the garb of conscientious sacrifice to 
establish precedents for the public good, evils of 
serious importance to the freedom and prosperity 
of the republic may arise." Do any of us forget 
the flame of enthusiasm which these sentiments 
kindled in the ardent and confiding hearts of the 
freemen of this country ? In the election of General 
Jackson, they looked forward to the establishment 
of all these excellent principles as cardinal maxims 
in his administration. The most extravagant antici- 
pations of great benefits were confidently indulged. 
Could such a man, with such pure principles, be 
placed in the executive chair, a sun bright with 
millennial glory would, it was said, dawn upon the 
republic, never to go down. All grievances would 
be redressed ; all tears would be wiped from all eyes ; 
his administration, compared with all others, would be 

" An era of sweet peace 'midst bloody annals ; 
A green spot in tlie desert of past centuries." 

Were these fond and fanciful hoj^es realized? The 



134 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

election of 1828 ended in the success of the man who, 
by propagating those doctrines, had made himself 
the idol of the people's hearts. How, sir, was this 
generous confidence requited? 'No sooner was he 
firmly seated on the throne of power, than, as if 
to show his scorn for popular credulity, he boldly 
marched into the Senate, and took its members 
away to make his cabinet council. This House was 
literally emptied to fill places made vacant by 
removal ; not one, or two, or three, but whole 
squadrons of members were marched ofi* to be made 
the subjects of reward, from foreign ministers of the 
highest grade, down to petty clerkships in the execu- 
tive departments. Gratitude for friends and revenge 
for foes ; the maxims of Sylla were openly avowed 
as the doctrines upon which executive patronage was 
to be dispensed. I shall not soon forget an instance 
of reward and punishment, which created, at the 
time, not merely astonishment, but strong indigna- 
tion, in Ohio. General Harrison was a native son 
of Virginia. In his nineteenth year (I believe being- 
then a lieutenant in the army), he was selected by 
General Wayne as one of his aids, in the memorable 
cam])aign of 1794, which terminated the war with 
the Indian tribes of the north-west. At a very 
early age he was chosen a delegate to Congress 
from the j^orth-western Territory, and subsequently 
made Governor of the Territory of Indiana. After 
the disastrous campaign of Hull, in 1812, he was 
selected by the Government to command those noble 
Kentucky and Ohio volunteers, who thronged in 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 135 

thousands to the tented field, to redeem the sinking 
fortunes of the war. My gaUant friend from Ken- 
tucky [Colonel Johnson] won those unfading laurels, 
to which time only adds fresh verdure, fighting under 
the immediate eye and command of Harrison, at the 
ever-memorable battle of the Thames. At the close 
of the war, General Harrison resigned his commis- 
sion, and, in the spirit of the example of Cincinnatus, 
retired to his farm in Ohio. From thence he was 
soon called by the legislature of that State to a seat 
in the Senate. Such a citi2;en was thought by the 
administration then in power a fit representative of 
this government at the capital of the Colombian 
re23ublic. He had not been friendly to the election 
of Greneral Jackson. In one month, I believe, after 
the inauguration of the latter, and before Greneral 
Harrison was known to have reached Bogota, his 
place of destination, he was recalled, and a member 
(then) of this House, a warm, active, industrious, 
powerful friend of the new President appointed in 
his place. Thus the active, useful friend was re- 
warded; the opponent punished. 

After all this forgetfulness of pledges given and 
public will expressed, when the President, and his 
friends for him, allege that he has taken the cus- 
tody of the public money from a long-tried and faith- 
ful agent, because it is the people's will, I must be 
pardoned while I doubt. Sir, if I had that faith 
which could remove mountains, I should still hesi- 
tate to believe the sincerity of this declaration. 

Mr. Speaker, no opinion, no principle is in this 



136 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

country so universally well received by the people 
as that Avhich teaches public servants the duty of 
redeeming, when in office, pledges given when can- 
didates for office. It is right, it is proper that it 
should be so. It is the compact between the servant 
and his employer, and should be fulfilled by the 
former, at all times, with scrupulous fidelit}^ The 
great importance of this operative principle, in a 
representative government, will excuse me to the 
House for calling their attention to another flagrant 
instance of its violation, by one who now professes to 
make it the ground and cause of his late extraordi- 
nary movement upon the bank and treasury of the 
United States. 

When the present Executive first took his seat in 
the Presidential chair, he announced to the people, 
in his inaugural address, his determination to reform 
a great variety of existing evils in the administration 
of public afi'airs. Among other things, high on the 
list of these reformations, was inscribed "the duty 
of reforming those abuses which had brought the 
patronage of the Federal Government to bear on the 
freedom of elections."* The interpretation of this was 
simple and well understood. It implied that officers, 
holding their places under the general government, 
had used their influence and employed their time in 
the business of electioneering. It avowed a determi- 
nation to dismiss from service all such, and to make 
it a rule in all future appointments that none should 



* See IiKnii'ural Address of President Jackson, Appendix.. 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 137 

receive or hold office. This was apphiiided, and 
everywhere received as the first bright gleam of that 
millennial glory that had been so confidently foretold 
by the friends of the President during the canvass 
prior to the election of 1828. 

Passing by other examples of the operation of this 
reform, I refer, with unaftected pain, to one which 
lately occurred in my own State. On the 8th of 
January last, a convention, under the general denom- 
ination of the "friends of the present administration," 
assembled at Columbus, in the State of Ohio. Its 
object was to appoint delegates to represent the 
"party" in a proposed national convention, which 
was to be convened in May, 1835, to nominate a suc- 
cessor to Greneral Jackson. This convention of the 
"friends of the present administration" was com- 
posed of one hundred and seventy-seven persons. Of 
these, seventy-one were office-holders under the Fed- 
eral and State Grovernments. A gentleman holding 
the office of district judge for the district of Ohio, 
under appointment of the President, not yet con- 
firmed by the Senate, in his character of a "central 
committee man," called a meeting (by advertisement 
in a public newspaper) of the "friends of the admin- 
istration" in a particular county, for the purpose of 
naming delegates to this convention at Columbus. 
All these things are matters of public notoriety. The 
convention, among other things, constituted a "cen- 
tral committee," with electioneering jurisdiction co-ex- 
tensive with the territorial limits of the State. Of this 
committee, composed (according to my recollection) 



138 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

of seven persons, five are officers holding appoint- 
ments under the Executive : one district attorney ; 
two receivers of public moneys ; one surveyor of the 
Virginia military lands ; and one postmaster. 

The proceedings of this convention have been pub- 
lished in the official journal in this city, and can not 
have escaped the notice of the President. Can a case 
be imagined more proper for the aj^plication of that 
reforming power which the President, at his instal- 
lation into office, had promised the people to exert 
with such unsparing fidelity? Where slept the execu- 
tive thunders while these iniquities were transpiring? 
Has one of those federal officers been removed, 
or even censured for "bringing the patronage and 
influence of the Government to bear upon elections ?" 
No. All is tranquil and placid. The arm of execu- 
tive vengeance is not lifted against the offender. 
The brow of power is not even clouded by a frown 
of disapprobation. After such forgetfulness, not only 
of pledges given, but also of the expressed will of the 
people derived from elections, in which this subject 
of official influence upon popular elections was agi- 
tated all over the Union, I can not hear with patience 
the "people's will" put forward as a reason for vio- 
lating law ; taking away chartered rights ; deranging 
the currency; destroying trade; and sinking in the 
great "Serbonian bog" of "executive power" all the 
Constitutional functions of Congress and the judicial 
courts. 

Finding (after a fruitless search) no reason for the 
act of which we complain, founded in law or ex[)edi- 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 139 

ency, or any dictate of public necessity ; but, on the 
contrary, linding, as the experiment has evinced, 
every consideration of duty and patriotism opposed 
to it, how shall we account for it ? We are driven to 
the necessity of resorting to reasons and motives for 
the act which are not clearly set forth in any official 
document. 

We know that the President has, for some two or 
three years, felt and expressed a deep and settled 
hostility to the United States Bank. We know that 
he and his friends believed that certain individuals 
connected with the bank, were not friendly to his 
election, and did not yield unqualified approbation to 
some of his public acts. A resolution, we are told 
by Mr. Duane, was formed to crush this supposed 
opponent; Congress, at its last session, had been 
appealed to for this purpose ; but, instead of adopting 
a course like that taken since by the President, that 
body, composed of a large majority of his political 
friends, by a vote of more than two to one, resolved 
that the public moneys were safe in the Bank of the 
United States, and ought to remain there. What 
was to be done? The bank must be crushed, and 
Congress had refused to become its executioner. Two 
or three months prior to the meeting of this Con- 
gress, the Secretary of the Treasury is required to 
remove the public moneys to the State banks. He 
declined, and oifered as his reasons, the vote of the 
last Congress and the near approach of the meeting 
of this ; that the subject properly belonged to Con- 
gress, and to them it ought to be submitted. What 



140 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

was the reply of the President? I will give it upon 
the authority and in the words of Mr. Duane's letter: 
" If the last Congress had remained a week longer in 
session, two -thirds would have been secured to the 
bank by corrupt means; and that the like result 
might be apprehended at the next Congress. That 
such a State bank agency must be put into operation,' 
before the meeting of Congress, as would show that 
the United States Bank was not necessary ; and thus 
some members would have no excuse for voting for 
it." I can not here, sir, stoop to the consideration of 
these suggestions of corrupt influence upon the repre- 
sentatives of the people. Let that people determine 
whether the servants of their own free choice are 
capable of acting from the diabolical motives attrib- 
uted to them. I have mistaken the character of my 
countrymen, or they will treat such imputations upon 
the emanations of their own enlightened and free suf- 
frage as the insane ravings of unchastened ambition, 
or the equally idle suggestions of unbridled revenge. 
If this history of the transactions of the last summer 
be true, what is the conclusion ? The corruptibility 
of Congress is imagined as a reason for transferring 
their powers and duties to the hands of the Execu- 
ti^^e. Thus, purity of motive in the President would 
apologize for a revolution of the Government. Sir, 
this is not the first instance in which the fears and 
patriotic prejudices of the people have been assailed 
for the purpose of effecting this favorite measure — 
the destruction of the bank. 

There exists in the minds of the x\merican people 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 141 

a watchful jealousy of foreign influence in our political 
atfairs. Two years ago this jealousy was roused to a 
degree of fanaticism that became in its hight abso- 
lutely ridiculous. It was found that nearly eight 
millions of stock in the United States Bank were 
owned by foreigners. I shall not soon forget the 
parade made in this hall, and elsewhere, of the list 
of names of those foreign stockholders. Man}- of 
them, it was found, were females. Nothing could 
exceed the patriotic rage and horror depicted in the 
fierce gestures, distorted countenances, and fervid 
declamations of those who had all at once discovered 
that the liberties of America were sold to the women 
of England! Had they been only simple, plain 
gentlewomen, it seemed the danger would not have 
been so appalling; but there were countesses, mar- 
chionesses, and, it was suspected, even a duchess ! 
This was not to be borne. A countess, it was clear, 
could at once put an end to State rights ; and a 
duchess — a duchess could swallow the whole con- 
federacy at a meal ! All the foes of the bank, with 
the President himself, trembled at the peril which 
impended over us. In the zeal and fervid enthusiasm 
which the occasion inspired, these female stockholders 
were depicted as a grizzly host of amazons, leagued 
and armed for the destruction of the last hope of 
liberty; ready, and just now about to bear down 
upon and crush us at a blow ; not as their renowned 
ancestress, Boadicea of old, made war upon the 
legions of Claudius, with brand, and bill, and bow, 
and spear, and battle-ax, but with weapons more 



142 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIIV, 

sharp and deadly — with pounds, shillings and pence. 
A host was marshaled to beat back this feminine 
invasion. From every quarter, but chiefly from 
JN^ew York, recruits thronged in thousands, and took 
the field, resolved to drive out this foreign female 
invading foe, or, as became men, to die in the 
glorious attempt. The President, as usual, took 
the command. The American eagle erected his 
head, and spread his wings abroad, not with that 
glorious motto, "-E Pluribus Unimi,^^ which had 
floated with him in triumph over many a red field 
of slaughter, but with another, which suited better 
the character and objects of the war. Just under 
his wing, and concealed from all but the keen eye 
of rapacity, might be seen these memorable w^ords — 
" Spoils of Victory." Thus bannered and equipped, 
with vetoes for weapons, and "British booty and 
British beauty " for their war-cry, they took the 
field. ^Vlio could doubt the result? As was ex- 
pected, the she-aristocracy of England capitulated 
to the mailed chivalry of America without risking 
a battle, and marched home without loss of baggage. 
Have any of us forgotten the shout of triumph that 
l)ealed over the continent? 'A nation was redeemed 
from the iron yoke of foreign oppression." Twelve 
millions of freemen, just ready to be sold for eight 
millions of dollars — just about to be knocked off at 
11.50 a head — are now forever free! But, alas! who 
can fathom the dej^ths of the future? Who could 
have foreseen the sad reverses that were to befall 
this victorious host? In the agitations of this war 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 143 

upon foreign capital, commerce furled up her sail ; 
the hand of industry was paralyzed ; labor wanted 
employment ; and public credit shivered on the brink 
of bankruptcy. Now the scene changes ! Where 
now^ is that American eagle so lately flying in 
triumph over the ranks of war? His wing folded 
up, his eye glazed and sunk w4th hunger, you send 
him abroad to peck and beg about the den of the 
British lion, for a morsel that may fall from the 
jaws of the royal beast, to keep him alive. Penn- 
sylvania begs of the foreign banker (Rothschild) a 
few millions to pay her honest debts; and New 
York, foremost in the war against foreign capital 
and foreign influence, ofl^ers a mortgage of her State 
to those very old women of England for six millions 
of foreign gold, to make safe her "safety fund." Sir, 
I hope, nay, I doubt not, they will succeed. These 
fierce countesses and fat duchesses will relent, and 
yield them the desired boon. The chivalry, so lately 
displayed by those who solicit it, must prevail ; for 
valor is ever potent to subdue the obduracy of the 
female heart. To this ridiculous issue have come 
the outcry and war waged against foreign capital. 
It would be a tempting theme for pleasantry, were 
it not associated with misfortune, disaster, and ruin 
to a confiding and deceived community. Strange as 
it may seem, those events in human afikirs which 
often excite laughter and ridicule, are intimately 
associated with those that smite the spirits of men 
with grief and dismay. 

" Res omnes sunt humanae, flebile ludibrium." 



144 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

It is in no spirit of contest, but with a sincere 
desire to bring the judgment of the House to that 
which I conceive to be the only point necessary to 
decide, that I design to offer as a substitute for the 
resohition on the table the following : 

" Resolved, That the reasons of the Secretary of the Treasury, 
for the removal of the public deposits from the Bank of the 
United States, are insufficient, and that it is inexpedient to enact 
any law authorizing the Secretary of the Treasury to deposit the 
public moneys in the State banks." 

The committee of Ways and Means have not 
thought proper to present this question to the House. 
Instead of a decision of the House upon this jDoint, 
which it is clearly our duty to make under the law, 
the committee have presented a variety of abstrac- 
tions, tending to no practical ends. Should the vote 
of the House disapprove the reasons of the Secretary, 
his course can not be mistaken. He must restore t«.) 
the United States Bank what he has taken from it, 
or he must ''put his house in order." 

After all that has or can be said concerning a 
remedy for the evil that is now preying upon the 
country, I have been unable to see or think of any- 
thing which promises success, but an immediate halt 
in our march to destruction, and, as speedily as pos- 
sible, a return to the point from which we set out. 
When you find yourselves in a course of ruin, does 
not wisdom require you to retrace your steps ? 

Sir, notwithstanding the confidence of the majority 
here in its strength, I yet hope to see it take counsel 
of prudence. The eyes of the i)eople have been 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 145 

opened to the true cause of their sufferings. Two 
months ago it was asserted, by the supporters of the 
executive measures, that the war upon the bank, 
begun two years ago, and consummated last October, 
had (wrought no ill consequences to the people. The 
loud and incessant cry from all quarters, that has 
been pouring in upon us since the session began, can 
now no longer be misunderstood. In this dilemma, 
the distress of the country being admitted, we are 
told it is all chargeable to the oppressive conduct 
of the bank. 

I must beg the attention of gentlemen who assume 
this position to a report of the bank, which came to 
us yesterday ; it contains a statement of facts, denied 
by no one, which must put at rest forever all further 
accusation against that abused institution. It shows 
that, instead of curtailing its accommodations below 
the amount withdrawn from its resources, it has, 
wdthin the last six months, increased those accommo- 
dations by nearly three millions of dollars, in pro- 
portion to its means. To be accurate, the account 
stands thus : 

Public and private deposits withdrawn between 1st Oc- 
tober, 1833, and the 1st of iVpril, 1834 $7,788,403 

Reduction of loans within the same period 5,057,527 

Difference 12,730,870 

By this plain tale, the oft-refuted story of the 
tyranny of the bank, is at once "put down." The 
bank, during the whole of that scene of confusion 
and bankruptcy which was begun by the Executive 



146 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIN". 

in the recess of Congress, has been straining all her 
energies to mitigate the force of the blow aimed at 
her, but which fell with fatal eifect upon the country. 

By the same report, gentlemen may learn why it 
is that, at this moment, so many of their favorite 
State banks are alive. During the six months past, 
the State banks have been indebted to the United 
States Bank in the average amount of three millions 
and a half of dollars. They might have been called 
upon at any moment for this sum. In mercy to them 
it has not been done. Yet it has been asserted here, 
and the presses devoted to the administration have 
been loud and constant in their assertions, that the 
United States Bank was curtailing its loans to mer- 
chants, bringing, in this way, bankruptcy upon its 
debtors; that it was laboring to crush the State 
banks by the same means ; all in order to extort 
from Congress a renewal of its charter. 

The country is beginning to look to the origin of 
the evils that afflict it. It sees that those who have 
been exerting power (if the conduct of the Executive 
deserves so mild a designation) are the real authors 
of the universally prevalent distress of which they 
complain. The country now knows that the bank, 
instead of causing or increasing this distress, has 
been endeavoring to mitigate its severity. 

All that has happened from the ruinous policy of 
the executive was foretold, and the advisers of this 
fatal measure were warned against it. They were 
warned by the opinion of practical honest men every- 
where, who dared to speak truth, even to the unwil- 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 147 

ling ear of power. The President, however, and his 
Secretary, heeded not their advice, but gave their 
ears and understandings to the keeping of visionary 
empirics who knew not, nor it seems, cared, what ills 
their pernicious counsels might bring upon the 
country. While merchants, boards of trade, and 
chambers of commerce, all foresaw and foretold the 
consequences to our trade and currency, likely to 
flow from the act of the Secretary of the Treasury, 
long before it had been consummated, some financial 
quack was at work with his arithmetical quantities 
and algebraic equations, showing the President, by 
"demonstration," that "the removal of five millions 
from bank A to bank B could result in nothing but 
simply a change of locality." 

This problem was the beginning and end of the 
cabinet lucubration on this subject. It is humiliating 
to compare the unpardonable ignorance of those in 
power, of the practical business concerns of the 
country, with the clear foresight on the same 
subjects possessed by men in very humble stations, 
to be found all over this Union. It reminds me 
forcibly of an observation, upon a kindred subject, 
by one of the profoundest political philosophers of 
the last age. * He observed, that he had often known 
merchants with the sentiments and abilities of great 
statesmen, and had seen persons in the rank of 
statesmen with the conceptions and characters of 
peddlers ; that he had found nothing in any habits of 

5i= Edmund Burke. 



148 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

life or education which tended wholly to disqualify 
men for the functions of Government, but that by 
which the power of exercising these functions is often 
acquired. "I mean," says he, "a mean spirit, and 
habits of low cabal and intrigue, which I have never 
seen, in one instance, united with a capacity for sound 
and manly policy." Let the people, who feel the 
unhap2:)y results of a single error of the Executive, 
determine where the statesmen and where the 
peddlers of this nation are to be found. 

I have heard gentlemen from various quarters of 
the Union describe the blighting effects of the policy 
lately adopted upon their respective vicinities. I am 
fully persuaded that no portion of the country can 
feel this blight more intensely than the young States 
of the West. The simplest principles of political 
economy will satisfy gentlemen that I am not mis- 
taken in this opinion. I wish, sir, that every man, 
entitled to a vote, west of the Alleghanies, had a 
copy of the speech of the gentleman from Georgia, 
[Mr. Wilde]. That clear and powerful analysis of 
the laws of currency, with those large and compre- 
hensive views of our present condition, which do 
equal honor to the head and heart of my honorable 
friend, can not fail to be read and studied with 
advantage, and by the philosopher not less than the 
peasant. 

Trade can not be carried on without capital ; capital 
is the gradual accumulation of labor and enterprise. 
^Old countries, where labor is unfettered, will, there- 
fore, abound in surplus capital; while, in new 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 149 

countries, it can not exist to any extent, since time 
has not been there given for its accumulation. 
Throughout the great valley, stretching from the 
sources of the Ohio to the Missom^i, now filled with 
a hardy and laborious population, you have a soil 
teeming with production. What avail the labor of 
the husbandman, and the fertility of the earth, if 
capital is wanting to buy and transport to market 
the annual products of both? The labor of all that 
population, up to this time, has been expended in 
paying for the land it tills ; and, by culture and im- 
provement, increasing its production. The Bank of 
the United States has furnished the West with a 
capital which it wanted, for which it languished, and 
which it must again want, if that bank be compelled 
soon to close its business, and withdraw its capital. 
Two years ago we were told, in the President's 
veto message, that the West must become bankrupt, 
by paying six per cent, interest on the debt it owed 
the United States Bank, How was that debt cre- 
ated ? By a loan from the bank, of its money, at 
six per cent, per annum. This money was employed 
in trade ; in buying and transporting to market the 
products of the country, I speak from actual knowl- 
edge when I say, that I have known large amounts 
of money borrowed fi'om individuals at ten per cent, 
interest, and employed in purchasing, for speculation, 
the agricultural productions of the Miami valley, I 
know that money thus loaned has been profitabty 
expended in this trade; that borrowers have often 
realized handsome profits on capital thus loaned and 



150 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

thus employed. The difference between six and ten 
per cent., which is paid for the use of the money thus 
employed, is lost, not by the purchaser, but by the 
farmer who sells the property thus purchased. 

Again : The effect of the withdrawal of the United 
States Bank from the West will be to open the office, 
and reinstate the business of the broker. The money 
in circulation there will ( as even now, within the last 
month, it does) rate at a discount of from two to ten 
per cent, in the Eastern cities. 

This will be the currency received by the farmer 
and mechanic for the products of their farms and 
workshops. 

The merchant, who sells his goods to them, must 
pay for those goods in the Atlantic cities, in a 
currency at ipar there. He, of course, makes his 
customers, the farmers and mechanics, pay him, in 
the increased price of his goods, the two or ten per 
cent, which he will have to give on the money he 
receives, in order to procure such funds as will pay 
his debt to the merchants in Philadelphia or New 
York. The withdrawal, then, of the capital of the 
bank, which has been constantly employed in facil- 
itating domestic exchanges, will, by diminishing com- 
petition, increase the profits of the broker. Those 
profits, made by large capitalists, when they swell 
to an unreasonable extent, are a clear loss to the 
laboring and producing classes. 

The West will be a peculiar sufferer under this 
policy in another, and by no means the least delete- 
rious of its consequences. All the revenues of the 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 151 

Federal Government are derived from impost duties 
on foreign goods, and from the sales of public lands. 
The consumer of the goods on which the impost is 
laid pays the duty, No portion of the population of 
the Union, in proportion to its numbers, consumes 
more of those articles subject to duty than the people 
of the West. They, therefore, contribute, from the 
earnings of their labor, the full proportion of the 
common revenue derived from imposts. The three 
millions annually paid for lands is received wholly 
from the Western and South-western States. A 
proportion of this revenue, suited to the business of 
the country, has been left heretofore in the United 
States Bank in the West, to be employed as so much 
capital by our own citizens. This office your State 
banks, as the experiment has proved, can never per- 
form for them. Their revenue will be poured into 
the laps of the Atlantic cities. How are they to be 
expended by the Government? Internal improve- 
ment, it was once hoped, might be the means of 
expending some portion of it in the West; but that 
system, by the interposition of the President's veto 
power, is destroyed. Your whole revenue (of which 
as I have shown, the West pays its full projwrtion) 
will be expended in harbors, arsenals, fortifications, 
and dockyards on the seaboard, and circulate there 
for the benefit of the Atlantic States alone. In such 
a system there is no equity, no equality of burden 
and benefit 

If, as I have shown, the States of the West are to 
sufier more than any other great geographical divi- 



152 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

sions of the confederacy, Ohio (my own State), of all 
the West, will suffer most from the reduction of prices 
and stagnation of trade. She is one of those who, 
according to the President's opinion, "ought to 
break ;" she has "traded on borrowed capital," She 
has borrowed, and now owes, five millions of dollars. 
With this money she has, with an enterprise unsur- 
passed in the ancient or modern history of any com- 
munity, executed a great work of internal improve- 
ment, which should have been done long since at the 
expense of the whole Union. Her four hundred 
miles of canal has poured the waters of the great 
lakes of the North into the Gulf of Mexico. Ohio 
must look for a fund to pay the interest on this 
debt, thus contracted, to the tolls collected on her 
canals. The amount of those tolls must depend on 
the trade of the country. If prices fall, and trade 
languish, (as we know they have, and will yet still 
more, unless we stop short in our present experi- 
ment,) the laboring people of Ohio will find their 
taxes increased. The interest on their canal debt 
must be paid, and what the tolls do not pay must be 
raised in taxes on the people. Thus, while your cruel 
policy diminishes the price of every article produced 
by the farmer and mechanic, and thus diminishes 
their ability to pay, it increases the tax, and swells 
the demands upon them. You starve the slave and 
yet increase his labor; you increase the burden of the 
people, and at the same time reduce the strength 
requij:ed to bear it. What can the peoj)le of the 
West see (if this new system is to prevail) in the 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 153 

prospect before them? J^Tothing but ruin to their 
trade, paralysis to their industry, and, worst of all, 
that host of vice and crime which will spring up 
everywhere, when labor has no incentive, industry 
no adequate reward. 

Have the people of that portion of your country 
deserved this at your hands ? Instead of extending a 
parental regard to them, you have abandoned them 
to premature orphanage and cold neglect. Is there 
anything in their history that merits this? Less 
than fifty years ago, urged on by enterprise or neces- 
sity, the first settlers plunged into the western wilder- 
ness. For many years, every cabin was a fort — 
every cornfield a camp. Every night the husband 
and father. Math arms in his hands, guarded the 
slumbers of his wife and children. At every sound 
that broke upon the stillness of the surrounding- 
woods, the wakeful mother clasped her infant closer 
to her breast, and breathed a silent prayer for protec- 
tion, to "Him with whom mercy sits at the right 
hand, and judgment at the left." If they assembled 
to worship God, it was in the woods, upon the hill- 
side, or in the deep valley. There, still, they were 
girt round with peril and war. The song of praise 
was often interrupted by the yell of the Indian war- 
rior, rushing from his ambush to bathe the scalping- 
knife and tomahawk in the white man's blood. 

That savage foe has fled before their advancing 
enterprise, until the receding echoes of his war-whoop 
are now borne upon the blast that sweeps across the 
great prairies of the farthest West ; a little while, 



154 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

and they will be drowned forever in the roar of the 
Pacific. 

The people of the Western States are just begin- 
ning to realize the fruits of years of privation and 
toil. They have not expected the cup to be dashed 
from their lips. They understand, for they have 
already felt, the consequences of the late movement 
of the Executive on the currency and trade of the 
country. 

They have had, in their recent history, some 
knowledge of that sort of currency which depends on, 
and comes from State banks. They will not be satis- 
fied with your ingenious speculations as to what will 
be — they have made a terrible experiment, exactly 
like that you now propose to make, and they know 
what the}^ have suffered and lost ; they are unwilling 
to surrender the wisdom learned by experience, to 
the theories of any one. 

While we deplore the irreparable mischiefs that 
follow to the interest of those w^e represent, fi'om the 
unexpected change latel}^ wrought in our financial 
system, let me, in conclusion, beseech gentlemen to 
look to that power, hitherto unknoAvn in our political 
history, by which the President alone has effected 
that change. 

How has that power revealed to us its tremendous 
energies within the last six months ? The President 
has obtained uncontrolled possession of the public 
treasure in the recess of CongTess ; and, by this bold 
maneuver, he has, with the aid of his veto power, 
placed it beyond the power of Congress to reclaim 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 155 

their lost rights, unless a majority of two-thirds of 
both branches shall unite in opposition to him. When 
we see the rights of the Legislature thus invaded, 
it is natural to inquire, what great good has been 
achieved ? What fearful evil impending over us has 
been averted by it? Has the American dictator, like 
the Roman, "taken care that no detriment should 
come to the republic?" No; the exact reverse is the 
truth. 

He has taken your whole treasure fi^om the custody 
where, it is admitted, it was perfectly secure, and 
placed it in the keeping of State banks, where we 
are not sure it is safe for the passing hour. In doing 
all this, he boasts that he crushed the United States 
Bank ; that he has, in the hyperbolical langaiage of 
his friends, "strangled a monster!" In the true 
style of the mock-heroic, the fabulous exploits of 
Hercules are put forward as parallel achievements. 
Meantime, in destroying one bank, he has given life 
and perpetual existence to one hundred other banks. 

He crushes one serpent, and, at the same moment, 
he places in the vitals of the State innumerable 
knots and endless involutions of hungry tapeworms, 
to gorge their ravening and insatiable maws upon 
the very sources of life. 

It was the idle vaunt of a renowned general, in 
the declining period of the Roman republic, "that 
he could call up armed legions with the stamp of his 
foot." Sir, we have lived to see the acts of one man 
produce phenomena more appalling than the reality 
of the proud Roman's boast. 



156 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

"We liave seen the " Executive " ministerial officer 
of the most limited Government on earth, expand 
the mere emblem of authorit}" into the amplitude 
of kingly prerogative, and, of his own will, com- 
municate to it the strength and xigor of imperial 
sway. Thus armed, he grasps, with his own hand, 
the wealth and energies of a nation's commerce; and 
in a day they wither into imbecile bankruptcy in his 
clutch. AMth this same power he enters the humble 
dwelling of the laboring poor man, or the neat man- 
sion of the industrious mechanic ; he sees there well- 
rewarded industry shedding smiles, and plenty, and 
innocent contentment uj^on a cheerful, happy family. 
At the wave of his hand, this vision of happiness 
disappears, and in its place come want and poverty, 
and squalid misery and woe. Look back over the 
whole history of your government. Do you find in 
it any executive power approaching to this ? ]S^o ; to 
find authority for this searching and overshadowing 
tp-anny, you must go to the groaning monarchies of 
Europe. English history, and not your own, will 
furnish you with such examples of "executive 23ower." 
Consult the reigns of the crafty Plantagenets — the 
obstinate and tyrannical Tudors; read the bloody 
anneals of the misguided Stuarts; there, and there 
only, will you find examples to compare with the 
last six months of our history. 

I entreat gentlemen to look out upon the country. 
You see the poor and the rich thronging to the capital 
for relief. They repair to the President's mansion ; 
its doors are rudelv closed against them. A Presi- 



ox THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 157 

dent, elected by the people, refuses to see and confer 
with them in the extremity of their distress — distress 
brought on them by his own act. The voice of abso- 
lute power bids them "go home;" they are only 
permitted to approach the throne through the cold 
and imperfect medium of written communication. 
Driven from thence, they come here — here, to their 
own immediate servants. How are they treated in 
this House ? An inflexible and proud majority de- 
nounces their assertions as falsehood — their opinions 
as folly. A press, devoted to power all over the 
country, answers to the universal wail of distress 
with grinning ribaldry and sneering scorn. Sir, if 
the lessons of past ages are not fables, and all history 
a lie ; if the whole theoiy of your government be not 
based upon fiction, we shall soon see the collected 
energies of an aggrieved, insulted people forcing 
their influence upon this hall. That influence will 
be felt here, where every pulsation must answer to 
the throb of public feeling. You will feel this, not 
in that might that slumbers in a freeman's arm, but 
in that fierce indignation which sleeps not, nor slum- 
bers in the freeman's bosom so long as he feels the 
cold iron of oppression entering into his soul. Mr. 
Speaker, I have done. The proofs of our misguided 
policy thicken upon us every hour. A blasted monu- 
ment of it at this moment stands, with empty vaults 
and closed doors,* in view from the windows of this 

* The Bank of Washington. Three other banks in the District 
stopped payment in a few days afterward. 



158 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

hall. If all these will not avail to change the stern 
resolves of the majority here, then I warn that 
majority to take counsel of their selfish fears ; let 
them remember the admonition of Holy Writ: — 
"Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty 
spirit before a fall." 



APPENDIX. 

Extract from Gen. Jackson's Inaugural Address, March 4^^ 1829. 

" The recent demonstration of public sentiment inscribes on tbe 
list of executive duties, in characters too legible to be overlooked, 
the task of reform; which will require particularly the correction 
of those abuses that have brought the patronage of the Federal 
Government into conflict with the freedom of elections, and the 
counteraction of those causes which have disturbed the rightful 
course of appointment, and have placed or continued power in 
unfaithful or incompetent hands." 

Extract from Mr. Jefferson's Circular, published and addressed to 
he various officers of the Government under his administration. 

" The President of the United States has seen, with dissatis- 
faction, officers of the General Government taking, on various 
occasions, active parts in the election of public functionaries, 
whether of the General or State Governments. Freedom of 
elections being essential to the mutual independence of Govern- 
ment, and of the different branches of the same Government, so 
vitally cherished by most of our Constitutions, it is deemed im- 
proper for officers depending on the Executive of the Union to 
attempt to control or influence the free exercise of the elective 
right; and further, it is expected that he (the officer) will not 
attempt to influence the votes of others, nor to take any part in 
the business of electioneering ; that being deemed inconsistent 
with the Constitution and his duties to it." 



ON THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 159 

The following is a statement of the amount of bank capital 
incorporated since 1832, derived from the best sources of informa- 
tion. It is doubtless, if incorrect at all, below the true amount. 
It shows how rapidly we are going on to banish bank paper from 
our currency. There are now (including the following) about 
five hundred State banks in operation. Yet we are gravely told 
that if we put down the United States Bank, we shall at once 
restore gold and silver currency, and get rid of paper altogether. 

Maine §100,000 

Vermont 600,000 

Rhode Island 1,000,000 

Connecticut 600,000 

New Jersey 100,000 

New York 4,000,000 

Pennsylvania 4,400,000 

Maryland , 500,000 

North Carolina 2,800,000 

South Carolina 500,000 

Mississippi 700,000 

Louisiana 12,000,000 

Tennessee 5,000,000 

Kentucky 5,000,000 

Ohio 4,000,000 

Indiana 1,000,000 

$42,900,000 

Mr. Corwin, at the conclusion of his speech, 
moved to amend the resohition by striking out all 
after " Resolved," and inserting in lieu thereof the 
following : 

" That the reasons of the Secretary of the Treasury for the 
removal of the public deposits from the Bank of the United 
States are insufficient, and that it is inexpedient to enact a law 
requiring the Secretary of the Treasury to deposit the public 
moneys in the State banks." 



MEMORIALS m RELATION TO THE 
PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 

[ In April, 1834, a period when a large portion of tlie people 
were deeply excited in consequence of tlie removal of the Public 
Deposits by the Secretary of the Treasury, (Mr. Taney,) Mr. 
CORWIN presented in Congress two memorials, from citizens of 
Warren and Clinton counties, Ohio, upon the financial embarrass- 
ments of the day. Although his remarks on those several occa- 
sions are brief, they state the object of the memorialists so fully, 
and contain such a well-expressed, and well-deserved compliment, 
to that portion of his constituents, that it would not be just 
either to him or to them, if they were omitted in this compilation.] 

Mk. Speaker: 

I am charged with the j^resentation to this House 
of a memorial, signed by about two thousand of the 
inhabitants of a single county of the district I have 
the honor to represent. By reference to the names 
and designations of occupations affixed to them, it 
will be seen that they are composed of farmers, 
merchants, and a gi-eat variety of those engaged in 
mechanical pursuits. They are emigrants, or the 
descendants of emigrants, from every State in the 
Union, and present in many respects a faithful min- 
iature picture of the manners, habits, tastes, and 
opinions, of the whole American population. The}" 
are generally" in that condition for which a pious and 
wise one of old so fervently prayed — ^they are neither 
rich nor poor, but in that happy medium between the 
(160) 



MEMORIALS OX THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 161 

extremes of poverty and wealth which philosophy 
had taug'ht and all experience proved to be most 
ftivorable to the cultivation of that only true dignity 
of character, a modest yet manly indej^endence of 
thought and action. They inhabit the most fertile 
portion of the Miami valley, a district of country 
remarkable for its exuberant production of those 
heavy articles of subsistence that ai'e everywhere 
regarded as the necessaries of life. For these, (the 
only subjects of export trade in that country,) the 
memorialists have usually found markets through 
the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, in the South, and 
lately through the Ohio canals and the lakes, in the 
IN'orth — markets which have yielded an encouraging 
reward to their industry; I say, sir, their industry, 
for in that country almost every man engaged in 
agricultural pursuits wields his own sickle and scythe, 
and plows with alacrity his own fields. I may say, 
without exaggeration, that they have a country and 
population that ( if need should be ) could realize the 
boast of the better days of the English commonwealth, 
when "every rood of gTOund maintained its man.'' 
Many of these memorialists came to that country 
while the wandering and marauding Indian tribes 
held there a divided empire with the arts and enter- 
prise of civilized life. They have lived, in half the 
length of years allotted to the life of man, to see 
the then unbroken forest disappear, and rich planta- 
tions, covered with luxuriant crops, rise up in its 
place. The Bank of the United States has, for the 
last fifteen years, furnished a capital for their trade,- 
11 



162 SPEECHES OF THOM'AS CORWIX. 

and a currency wliicli represented truly the exchange- 
able value of their property. This currency, always 
as good as gold or silver coin, is now rapidly dis- 
appearing, and the paper of State banks, having an 
estimated value never equal to its nominal amount, 
as rapidly taking its place. Experience, (that sure 
but, in these times, too much neglected teacher,) 
dearly bought, almost fatal, experience, has taught 
them that this last can not subsist without some 
power stronger than charter stipulations to regulate 
and control it. In the present state of affixirs they 
look with fearful anticipations to that ruinous condi- 
tion in which the establishment of the United States 
Bank found them, and from which the excellent 
administration of its functions, as a regulator of cur- 
rency, redeemed them. Without this institution, 
they expect to see again currencies of different values 
in different parts of the Union, with a difference of 
exchange operating, as it once did, as a tax, varying 
fi'om two to ten per cent., on every article they buy 
from the Atlantic cities. They expect to see State 
banks, all over the country, sinking into hopeless 
insolvency, leaving immense amounts of their paper 
worthless, in possession of those who have earned it 
with the labor of their own hands. They already 
feel the baneful influence of a deranged and vicious 
currency, in the depression of prices and general 
stagnation of trade. They see in that paralysis 
which has benumbed the great mercantile cities of 
the North and South-west, the near and sure approach 
of ruin to themselves — for they look to those great 



MEMORIALS OX THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 163 

hearts of trade for the life-blood which is to nourish 
the industry and enterprise of that rich interior of 
which they are a part. 

These memorialists believe that the evils, present 
and prospective, of which they complain, are to be 
traced to the late act of the Secretary of the 
Treasury in withholding the revenues of the countr}^, 
the money of the people, fi'om the United States 
Bank, where it had been heretofore safely kept and 
usefully employed. They assert, what is now con- 
ceded by all, that the money of the Grovernment and 
people was safe in the custody of the United States 
Bank, and fear that it is not so in the State banks 
that now have it. They insist that as the safety of 
the public treasure in the United States Bank is not 
denied, and as the bank has performed faithfully the 
duties pertaining to its fiscal agency, that the with- 
drawal from it of the public deposits, is indefensible 
upon principles of national good faith or sound policy. 
I have already informed you, that this memorial 
comes from a county bearing the venerated name 
of Warren, Having ever present to their minds the 
glorious associations connected with the name of '"the 
first great martyr to the cause of liberty," it is not to 
be expected that they should speak in "bated breath 
and whispering humbleness" of power usurped or 
power abused. In a strain of honest indignation, 
they declare the late conduct of the Secretary of the 
Treasury to be unwarranted by the Constitution or 
laws of the land. They appeal to Congress as the 
guardians of the law and their constituted agents. 



164 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

for redress. They ask you to vindicate their vio- 
lated Constitution and broken laws, by an immediate 
restoration of the public moneys to their former 
place of deposit. They pray you to recharter the 
United States Bank. These measures are respect- 
fully demanded of us as the only means by which 
lost confidence and quietude can be restored, and 
their prosperity, now rapidly declining, arrested in 
its downward career. 

[The above remarks were made April 7th, 1834. On the 28th, 
Mr. Corwin presented the Memorial from the citizens of Clinton 
county, and spoke as follows:] 

I AM charged, Mr. Speaker, with the duty of pre- 
senting a memorial to this House from one of the 
three counties composing the district I have the 
honor to represent. This memorial comes from 
Clinton county, in the State of Ohio. It is signed 
(as two most respectable gentlemen of the county 
inform me) by thirteen hundred and one citizens and 
qualified voters of that county. These are composed 
of all the trades and professions common to the 
country, but chiefly farmers — men who plow, and 
sow, and reap their own fields. The facts they set 
forth, and the opinions they hold, are not the offspring 
of a sudden excitement, produced by the agitations 
that often prevail without cause in large and popu- 
lous cities, ])ut the deliberate, well-considered judg- 
ment of each man's own unbiased understanding. 

Grentlemen who have not looked closely into the 
habits and pursuits of the people who inhabit the 



MEMORIALS OX THE PUBLIC DEPOSITS. 165 

interior agricultural regions of the West, can have 
but a faint idea of their true character. On a footing 
of the most perfect equality in all their civil and 
political rights ; independent in the fullest sense of 
the word ; their own labor crowned with the common 
blessing of Providence, places them beyond all de- 
pendence upon mortal man. Such, emphatically, 
are those whose prayer I now present to this House. 
Their minds, invigorated and purified by healthful, 
innocent labor, are not subject to artificial and unna- 
tural excitements ; nor can such a people be subject 
to that most vulgar intemperance of a deranged 
heart — a diseased craving after notoriety, and the 
miserable indulgences of mere worldly distinction. 
These memorialists assert that, within the last few 
months, they have experienced great scarcity of 
money, and depression of prices of all the produc- 
tions of their country. The existence of those evils 
has been often denied here. I now offer to prove 
them by thirteen hundred witnesses, as respectable 
as any equal number to be found in America. These, 
sir, are not the assertions of a party. At a late elec- 
tion in that county for representatives to the State 
Legislature, there were polled 1,410 votes — 1,301 
voters of the same county sign this memorial. This 
exhibits a unanimity not to be found where political 
party machinery is at work. They pray you tO' 
restore the public moneys to the custody of the 
United States Bank ; and, believing a national bank 
to be a national benefit, they ask a recharter of 
the old, or the establishment by law of a similar 



166 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIIS'. 

institution. I need not add that, next to the appro- 
bation of my own conscience, it gives me pleasure to 
find that I am sustained in the course I have pur- 
sued here on these great and exciting subjects, by so 
hirge and respectable a portion of my constituents. 



ox THE CONSTITUTION OF MICHIGAN. 

[The consideration of the President's Message transmitting to 
Congress the Constitution and other documents originating with 
a convention in the Territory of . Michigan, with a view to the for- 
^mation of a State Government, was resumed in the House of Kep- 
resentatives, December the 28th, 1835. The question of boundary 
between that Territory and the adjoining States (which, at one time, 
threatened a collision between Michigan and Ohio), incidentally 
came up during the debate ; and in reply to Messrs. Williams, of 
N. C, and Mason, of Va., Mr. Corwin rose and said :] 

It was not liis intention, at the opening of this dis- 
cussion, to protract the debate a moment; Ibut he 
was compelled, by a sense of imperative duty, to ask 
the attention of the House, for a few moments, to 
a view of this subject, presented by the gentleman 
from Virginia [Mr. Mason] who had just taken his 
seat. He had also a word to say (if he had rightly 
understood him) to the gentleman from North Caro- 
lina [Mr. Williams], 

The gentlemen, said Mr. C, seemed both to con- 
sider the question of boundary between Ohio and the 
proposed State of Michigan as a judicial question. It 
is very clear that, if this be a judicial question purely, 
it will be difficult to establish the right of this House 
to adjudge and determine it. It is of great import- 
ance, Mr. Speaker, that we should underetand well, 
before we act, whether we are acting within the scope 
of our acknowledged constitutional powers. If there 

(167) 



168 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

be a doubt, therefore, whether this question of boun- 
dary, or any other which may belong to the main 
proposition, (the admission of the new State.) be a 
question proper to be decided here, or referred to the 
judicial department, that doubt should be sufficient 
to send the whole to the Judiciary Committee — that 
committee being, both by the law of this House and 
its i^ractice, our legal and Constitutional advisers. 

Gentlemen will see the propriety of bringing this 
subject, with all its attendant topics, to the notice of 
that committee, when it is once perceiA'ed that the 
question of boundary can not be separated from the 
question of admission of the new State into the Union. 
It is incontrovertible that we have no power to alter, 
modify, or amend, the constitution of Michigan. This 
can onl}^ be done by a convention of the people of 
that territory. They have sent us an entire instru- 
ment, under which they proposed to become one of 
the American confederacy. We must therefore admit 
them with the constitution of their choice, as it is here 
presented, or we must reject them, if there be any- 
thing in that constitution which compels us to that 
course. If gentlemen will turn to the constitution of 
Michigan, it M-ill be seen that it ordains as well the 
boundaries of the proposed State as the rights, civil 
and political, of its inhabitants. They propose to 
become a portion of the Union, in the new character 
of a sovereign State, with territorial limits which 
comprehend a large and most interesting portion of 
two other sovereign States, to wit : Indiana and Ohio. 
This is determined by a glance at the maps of the 



ox THE COXSTITUTIOX OF MICHIGAX. 169 

country. The committee, then, which shall be charged 
with the investigation of this subject, must either 
leave that part of the constitution of Michigan, which 
ordains the boundaries of the State, out of view 
altogether, and admit them to come into the Union, 
claiming, if you please, to impose her form of govern- 
ment on all the people and over all the territory of 
Ohio and Indiana, or they must decide whether that 
portion of disputed territory, comprehended within 
the limits of the new State, belongs in truth and by 
law" to Michigan, or to Ohio and Indiana, according 
to their known claims, respectively. 

Will any committee, or will this House, admit a 
State into this Union without ascertaining its territo- 
rial jurisdiction ? Or will they, if it can be avoided, 
admit a State into this family of republics, with a 
license to sue one or two of her sisters ? ^Vhen she 
comes and knocks at your door, asking 2:)ermission to 
come into your house, that she may thereby more 
easily tight for and dispossess two of its old inmates 
of a portion of their property, will you take her by 
the hand and spirit her on to litigation, or more pro- 
bably to a contest of force ? Sir, I am ver}^ sure no 
such fatuity will ever possess this House ; it is cer- 
tain that no such necessity is imposed on us. AMiat, 
then, will your committee do? They will examine 
and determine whether the constitution of Michigan 
is consistent with the rights of Indiana and Ohio. 

I ask the gentlemen, not merely of the legal pro- 
fession, but those of every class in this House, to 
whom they would apply for an opinion on such a 



170 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

subject, were they iiersonally interested ? Michigan 
chiims to extend her constitution over the citizens of 
other States as now constituted, by virtue of a sup- 
posed compact, to that effect, in the ordinance of 
1787. How is the force of that claim to be ascer- 
tained? Who shall say whether a particular clause 
in that ordinance rises above the changeable and 
repealable character of ordinary legislation, and' 
assumes the more sacred and inviolable nature of a 
contract? 'No man, however elevated his general 
attainments, can be found vain enough to imagine 
himself competent to give an intelligent and safe 
answer to the question here involved, unless he be 
to some extent conversant with law as a science. 
Again, sir: The ordinance under which Michigan 
claims is but a law of Congress. Ohio and Indiana 
both claim under acts of Congress and compacts made 
with them as States. If these conflict, who is com- 
petent to determine which is paramount to the other? 
To what committee, in short, does this House refer 
questions of law ? The answer given in every other 
case to this question has been uniform — "the stand- 
ing committee on the Judiciary." Gentlemen who 
look only to the isolated fact of admission into the 
Union, wdll find that they can no more arrive at that 
l^oint, without first meeting and deciding all the grave 
questions of law I have suggested, than they could 
transfer themselves fi'om this hall to the northern 
lakes, without passing over the intermediate space. 

I hope gentlemen will not deem it beneath the dig- 
nity of this House to consult in this matter a little 



ox THE COXSTITUTIOX OF MICHIGAX. 171 

the feelings and views of both parties to this question 
of boundary. With them it has always been viewed 
as mainly a question to be resolved by a right con- 
struction of the acts and laws of Congress. It has 
thus been contested on both sides. You are appealed 
to as a final arbiter. They will expect you to call to 
your aid that committee to whom the nation look for 
correct opinions when construction of law is the ques- 
tion. Who has ever heard, till now, of submitting a 
legal proposition to the committee on the Territo- 
ries ? Sir, I disclaim all idea of drawing comparisons 
between the individuals composing either of these 
committees. I only insist that the laws of the House 
have assigned to each their apj^ropriate function, and 
the Speaker is presumed to have arranged the talent 
of the House in reference to those laws. For the 
people of my own State I only ask a fair trial, and in 
the usual way. Give them these, and those fearful 
excitements, of which the gentleman from Virginia 
has spoken, will be at once subdued into acquiescence 
in the decision, whether friendly or adverse to their 
claims. But should this House, to whom the appeal, 
in a generous confidence, has been made, blunder in 
the dark upon a wrong and unusual course, and ulti- 
mately decide against them, we may then look for 
agitations, accompanied with more frig'htful violence 
than the gentleman has imagined. 

I flatter myself that it is apparent to all, that now 
is the most propitious time to settle this unhaj^py 
controversy. I imagine all will agree that it is 
competent for this House to settle it. I entreat 



172 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

gentlemen not to think of leaving the question open. 
I appeal to the gentleman from Virginia, whether he 
could take pleasure in seeing three sovereign States 
prostrate before the judicial tribunals, asking of 3^our 
courts to determine whether they were States ! or, if 
States, whether they had any territory, and how 
much ! Sir, unbounded as my contidence has been, 
and is, in the federal courts, for their sakes, as well 
as the country, I do not wish to see questions which 
agitate great jDolitical communities brought frequently 
before them for decision. To avoid this, and to put 
forever beyond the power of contest this cause of dis- 
cord and disunion, I entreat the House to send this 
subject to the only committee comj^etent to analyze 
and present in a connected view all the questions 
that cluster round it ; and, with such a report, I do 
not permit myself to doubt but the House will come 
to a conclusion as satisfactory to, as it will be obli- 
gatory upon, all concerned. 



ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 

[The business first in order in tlie House of Eepresentatives of 
the United States, Thursday, January 12th, 1837, was the bill 
reported by Mr. Cambreling, from the committee of Ways and 
]Means, to reduce the revenue of the United States to the wants 
of the Government. There being two motions pending — first, 
for commitment, and, secondly, for indefinite postponement — Mr. 
CoRWiN arose and addressed the House as follows :] 

Mr. Speaker: 

I feel deeply sensible that I am about to occupy 
the time of the House upon a subject which can not 
possibly be matured into legislation during the brief 
period that remains to us of the present session. It 
is the conviction that the bill before you, ushered 
into this House with a haste bordering upon rash- 
ness, contains within its provisions principles too 
momentous and vitally aifecting a large portion of 
the country to be acted upon this session, that impels 
me to solicit the attention of the House to my reasons 
for sustaining the motion of the gentleman from Mas- 
sachusetts [Mr. Lawrence] for the indefinite post- 
ponement of the bill. Sir, I am not sure that my 
thorough conviction of the necessity of tranquilizing 
the j^ublic agitation, which the presence of this bill 
here will excite, by an immediate rejection or j^ost- 
ponement of it, would have overcome my habitual 
aversion to addressing the House, had I not, in com- 
mon with my friends from Massachusetts and Penn- 

(173) 



174 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

sylvania, felt that such a course could alone insure 
the minority of the committee, with whom the bill 
originated, against misunderstanding, as well here as 
among those whom we represent. Had the motion 
to lay the bill and report on the table and print 
them prevailed, a paper most elaborate in its struc- 
ture, and voluminous in its dimensions, would have 
gone forth to the country, bearing upon its face no 
intimation that the whole committee did not concur 
in it. To prevent the possibility of such miscon- 
struction, I feel it a duty to those who have honored 
me with a seat here to present my protest, against 
both the bill and the report which accompanies it, at 
the earliest moment possible. This poor privilege, 
sir, we had been denied yesterda}^, by the House, 
but for the timely substitution, by my friend from 
Massachusetts [Mr. Lawrence], of the motion for 
"indefinite postponement" for that which was made 
by the gentleman from New York [Mr. Cambreling]. 
The latter motion, by the strict law of parliament, 
did not permit the minority of the committee to utter 
even a syllable by way of dissent to the principles 
of the bill or the report. Courtesy, however, it seems, 
had uniformly conceded to a minority thus situated 
what the rigid rule denied ; but, in our case, the 
gentleman from New York [Mr. Mann] pertinaciously 
insisted on the letter of the law. Courtesy became 
inconvenient, and the "iron rule" of proscription 
was enforced. Permit me here, Mr. Speaker, to 
oifer my thanks to the gentleman from Maryland 
[Mr. Thomas] for his manly appeal to the House in 



ox THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 175 

our behalf. Such exhibitions of magnanimity are 
rare in these times, and ought not to pass unnoticed. 
I did desire, sir, to see the bill disposed of without 
entering into a debate on its merits; but as no ex- 
planation could be even hinted at without it, I am 
rejoiced that the present motion was made, which 
opens the entire measure proposed to free and full 
discussion. 

I shall have occasion to refer to the report, as that 
is the exposition presented of the principles and 
policy on which the bill is based. In doing this, 
as I have only heard it read, and have not had the 
advantage of a j^erusal of its contents, I can not 
pretend to quote its language, nor can I hope to 
be exact in giving even its substance. I am happy 
to see the honorable chairman of the Ways and 
Means [Mr, Cambreling] in his seat, who will set 
me right should I at any time unwittingly mistake 
or misrepresent the true imj)ort of his production. 
I am very sure the gentleman will discharge such a 
duty to himself and to me with the utmost alacrity. 
As he, I doubt not, regards this, the youngest of his 
financial progeny, as possessing every combination 
of symmetry and grace, he will not sit by and see 
its beauty marred, without instant interposition in 
its behalf. 

The most obvious objection to the introduction of 
this bill arises from a view of its intrinsic import- 
ance, and the difficult and delicate questions which 
are inseparable from any proposition which proposes 
a radical change in the existing tariff. The whole 



176 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

of the argument in the very vohiminous report, 
which is nothing but the bill on your table, with 
a few facts and inferences to prop and sustain it, 
may be condensed into one or two sentences of plain 
English. It is stated (and I shall not noAv attempt 
to controvert any fact to which I shall have occasion 
to refer) that the existing tariff extends protection 
to labor employed in manufacturing in this country, 
the annual product of which is $300,000,000. It is 
assumed (and, for the sake of the argument, I shall 
admit it) that the protection afforded by our existing 
tariff laws is necessary, and no more than is neces- 
sary, to enable our own manufacturing establishments 
to exist in competition with foreign establishments 
employed in the same business. To sustain this 
proposition, the high price of labor and capital with 
us, and the comparative cheapness of both abroad, 
are asserted. 

The report fm'ther asserts that the duties collected 
on imports by the rates established by the law of 
March, 1833, commonly called the Compromise Act, 
will, with the proceeds of the sales of public lands, 
bring into the Treasury, within the next eighteen 
months, more revenue, by seven millions of dollars, 
than the wants of the Government require. Here I 
beg gentlemen to observe that this last proposition 
is nothino- more nor less than a combination of two 
conjectures. The first of these is, that the importa- 
tions from abroad to this country, during the next 
five years, will reach a given amount. Whether this 
conjecture shall be verified must depend upon the 



ox THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 177 

numberless contingent events, the turn of which no 
human sagacity can foresee, arising out of the present 
unsettled condition of trade, labor, and currency, in 
Great Britain ; the change that may be brought about 
in the markets of England by the termination of the 
intestine wars now raging in Spain and Portugal; 
and, lastly, the very capability of this country to 
consume and pay for foreign importations must 
depend upon reducing to order, and stability the 
currency of this country, which, under the improving 
and sagacious guidance of this administration, has 
been conducted to a state of wild and unmanageable 
confusion. The next conjecture embodied in the 
proposition I have last stated from the report is, that 
the public lands are to be sold without any legislative 
or executive restraints as to purchasers or quantities. 
In other words, it suj^poses the famous Treasury 
circular to be repealed. I beg the gentlemen of the 
far West particularly to notice one feature of this 
report. It is based upon the supposition that the 
bill now on your table, reported by one of your 
standing committees, with that title so captivating to 
patriot ears, "A bill to arrest monopolies of public 
lands, and to prohibit the sales thereof, except to 
actual settlers, in limited quantities," is to be scouted, 
thrown out of doors, and its place to be supplied by 
this more recent and happy assault upon the popular 
ear, bearing on its front the charmed phrase, "A bill 
to reduce the revenue of the United States to the 
wants of the Grovernment." 

The House will bear in mind that this bill pro- 
12 



178 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

poses to remedy an apprehended evil. It looks into 
the future, and imagines that, in the next year and a 
half, the existing duties on imports will bring into 
the Treasury more money than is required for the 
uses of the Government by seven millions of dollars. 
I have already intimated that I object to the time 
selected for bringing into the House a measure 
fraught with so many difficulties as belong to every 
subject which proposes a radical change in our system 
of revenue. 

Without adverting, therefore, for the present, to 
the merits of the bill, I feel confident I do not appeal 
in vain to the House to say that we can not act upon 
it between this day and the 4th of March. Let gen- 
tlemen look at the necessary business now before us, 
and then calculate the number of days remaining for 
its final disposition. It will be remembered that 
Monday in every week is devoted to the reception of 
petitions; Friday and Saturday of each week, by 
another standing rule, are set apart for j)rivate 
claims. From what we have already seen during 
half the allotted term of the session, it is not to be 
expected that a moment of time can be withdrawn 
from that allotted to petitions, for the consideration 
of other business. No gentleman, I am equally sure, 
dreams that we should deny justice any longer than 
is unavoidable to the many hundreds of private 
claims which have been favorably reported on by 
that committee whose awards, with rare exceptions, 
are considered laws to the House. There is a largo 
body of claimants of a miscellaneous character in 



ox THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 179 

one class, and the crippled soldiers and widows and 
orphans, the representatives of those who have fallen 
in your late wars with both civilized and savage foes, 
in another, and a not less meritorious few of the sur- 
viving veterans of your revolutionary struggle in 
another class, all pointing to the reports of your own 
committee, and showing claims upon your justice, 
some of them delayed for half a century. I can not 
entertain so poor an opinion of the moral sense of 
an American Congress as to suppose it will turn aside 
from this work of justice and benevolence, to enter 
into dreamy and heartless disquisitions upon the 
balance of trade ; to ponder over tabular statements 
as incomprehensible as the Sybilline books; to adjust 
with contemptible accuracy, the ad valorem duty on 
a foreign penknife, and this, too, for the purpose of 
preventing a few millions more or less from coming 
into that very Treasury, whose doors, in the mean- 
time, you close against those who demand of you the 
payment of your honest debts, for the non-payment 
of which many of your creditors are languishing in 
poverty and want. 

You have then remaining for the dispatch of 
general legislation three days in each week, giving 
about twenty-two days for the consideration of bills 
of a general nature, and all the appropriations for 
the current year. I ask the majority of the Ways 
and Means, who have pushed this new and perplex- 
ing subject on the House at this time, if it is modest, 
to say the least of it, to suppose that the House is to 
vote away twenty-four millions of dollars in appro- 



180 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

priations, without inquiry, examination, or debate, 
further than to ask whether the committee of Ways 
and Means desire it should be done? I ask this 
House, whose constitutional and most imj^ortant 
function it is to know and approve the object to which 
every dollar is to be applied, before it sanctions its 
appropriation, whether it is willing, at the mere re- 
quest of a committee, to give a draft on the Treasury 
for nearly thirty millions of dollars, and thus become 
the mere ministerial agent of the Treasury depart- 
ment? This base abandonment of duty you must 
submit to, to this humiliation you must come, if you 
turn aside from the necessary duties of the session 
to consider the bill now before you; unless, indeed, 
you choose to rush madly upon an untried scheme, 
full of danger, and surrounded with doubt, upon the 
very reasonable presumption of the infallible wisdom 
of its authors. 

But, Mr. Speaker, if we had all the time we could 
desire, for the adjustment of a new system of legisla- 
tion to any real or supposed change in our condition 
at home, or with other nations, is this an auspicious 
period for the experiment? Turn for a moment to 
your latest advices from England. Every painful 
pulsation in that great heart of capital and trade is 
followed by a sympathetic throb on this side of the 
Atlantic. What is the state of currency throughout 
Great Britain now? The price of money rising, the 
banks stopping payment, and her financiers unable 
to foretell the time or the manner when or how this 
agitation shall end. Nor is our situation free from 



ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 181 

symptoms of coming misfortune. I shall not stop to 
inquire into the causes of the present anomalous 
.situation of our own currency. My friend from 
Massachusetts, [Mr. Lawrence,] who addressed you 
with so much force and clearness yesterday, has left 
nothing to be said by any one on these topics. Sir, 
the results of that gentleman's actual experience, the 
reflections of his sound understanding, always aided 
by the promptings of a good heart, are with me 
better authority, on such subjects, than a thousand 
quartos filled with speculations of closeted economists. 
We all know that, from some cause, trade and cur- 
rency seem to be divorced fi'om each other; domestic 
exchanges are no longer regulated by the course of 
trade, and the very report on your table complains 
of a redundant paper circulation. Who can tell 
when the causes which have produced these effects 
shall cease to operate? Who can say in what they 
will finally issue? In this distracted state of things, 
what are we asked to do? We are required to enact 
a law that shall tear from its very foundations, where 
they have rested for twenty years on the faith of your 
laws, a capital and labor which produce property 
equal to three hundred millions of dollars a year. 
Is this a time to force such an amount of capital into 
new employment? Is this that period of calm when 
so much labor can safely be driven, with sudden 
violence, to abandon its safe and tried pursuits, and 
seek at once other and unaccustomed channels ? No, 
surely this is not that time. On the contrary, it 
%vould add another to many elements of confusion 



182 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

already but too extensively and actively at work. 
Sir, it does seem to me that the unsettled state of 
the internal commerce and currency of this country 
is of itself an unanswerable objection to the present 
enactment of a law that all must see will powerfully 
increase the evils that already deeply afflict us. The 
natural instinct of brute animals, in such a crisis, 
would suggest caution and prudence as the course 
of wisdom, not rash adventure and wild experiment. 
If it were bad policy to protect by imposts the in 
dustry of your own people, if it could be shown to be 
unpatriotic and un-American to cherish by duties 
manufacturing skill, so that in time of war you might 
be able to furnish the commonest necessaries of life 
to your own j)eople, still, having done so, however 
unwisely at first, since by doing it you have created 
an immense amount of property, it would be mad- 
ness, moon-struck madness, to crush that property at 
a blow. Sir, by the laws now in force, if you but let 
them alone, in five years, by your own showing, the 
evil of which you now complain will cease to exist. 
Instead of this, we are now asked, in order to get rid 
of seven millions of surplus revenue, to destroy an 
annual production of three hundred millions; and 
are gravely told that this will be a most salutary 
financial operation. Let gentlemen keep constantly 
in mind that the bill and report go upon the admis- 
sion (at least it is not otherwise asserted) that the 
duties now imposed are barely sufficient to enable 
our own manufacturers to continue their business. 
With the single exception of iron, the report on your 



ON THE SUEPLUS REVENUE. 183 

table will, I think, be found to be in substance as I 
have quoted it. If, then, you diminish that protec- 
tion by curtailing it in the short space of eighteen 
months by seven millions, which by the law now in 
force would not be done till the end of five years, it 
follows, as a necessary conclusion, that you do 
abandon capital and labor, to the amount I have 
stated, to instant and total destruction. 

Mr. Speaker, I have only suggested so much of 
the merits of the subject as I deem necessary to 
direct the attention of the House to the importance 
and number of the questions which we are called 
upon to decide, before we can safely vote for or 
against the bill. If, then, reflection requires time ; 
if the exercise of reason is an agent in our researches 
after truth ; if knowledge is not intuitive, we j^oor 
mortals, who are not gifted with those inspirations 
which seem to be the peculiar attributes of the 
authors of this bill and report, must beg a moment's 
pause before we decide. We must jAod on in the 
old beaten way; we must proceed by painful and 
slow research; we must stop, look around us, and 
reflect much; and after great toil and a long journey, 
we may possibly reach those lofty hights of trans- 
cendental political wisdom which the authors of this 
bill have scaled with the speed of lightning at a 
single bound. Is it to be expected, I again ask, that, 
in the twenty-two days that remain for general busi- 
ness, we can canvass, item by item, appropriation 
bills to the amount of near twenty-seven millions, 



184 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

and have time left us to labor through the difficulties 
that attend the bill under consideration ? 

Mr. Speaker, in connection with the objections to a 
consideration of this bill, arising from a want of time, 
I must remind its authors, and the political majority 
of this House, of another subject, which, in justice 
to themselves and to the nation, they are bound to 
bring forward at the present session. I allude to an 
amendment of the Constitution, so that the election 
of President and Vice-president of the United States 
may, in no event, ever devolve on Congress. We 
are now approaching the termination of those eight 
years during which General Jackson has occupied 
the presidential chair. I believe each annual mes- 
sage to Congress, during all that time, has adverted 
in strong and sometimes imploring appeals to the 
National Legislature on this subject. I know that 
gentlemen have heretofore excused their neglect of 
these suggestions of the President, by saying that 
there was in the Senate a political majority opposed 
to them; and, therefore, the great reform, so much 
desired by the President and his friends, must wait 
till that opposition was subdued. Sir, whether fortu- 
nately or otherwise for the republic I will not say, 
but the fact is, that favored time, so long prayed for, 
has at length arrived. There is now a clear majority, 
in both branches of Congress, friendly to the existing 
administration. IS'ow, a time has at length come, 
when we may with confidence call upon the friends 
of General Jackson to redeem his and their pledges, 



ON THE SUKPLUS EEVENUE. 185 

SO often given, on this vital subject. I call especially 
at this time for action, and not promises and post- 
ponement. General Jcickson, after this session, will 
be no more here, to admonish or advise us touching 
this interesting subject. It has made an imposing- 
figure in that revolution which has subverted all the 
maxims of polity and law, whensoever and howsoever 
they were opposed to his suggestions. It has been a 
theme on which honest patriots and designing dema- 
gogues have dwelt with equal skill and power. The 
President, for the last time that his voice can ever 
be heard in public council, in language which be- 
speaks deep and abiding solicitude, again beseeches 
you to act. Hear what he says in his last message 
to Congress. Nearly at the close, and when he is 
about to bid a final adieu to you and the cares of 
public life, he gives this subject to your especial 
charge, with all the solemnity of a dying declaration. 
He says : " All my experience and reflection confirm 
the conviction I have so often expressed to Congress 
in favor of an amendment to the Constitution, which 
will prevent, in any event, the election of President 
and Vice-president of the United States devolving 
on the House of Representatives and the Senate ; 
and I, therefore, beg leave again to solicit your 
attention to the subject." 

Is there, then, any reason now for not carrying this 
recommendation into eifect, by the party having the 
power, in both House and Senate, to do so ? None. 
I call, then, upon the "Democratic party," as you of 
the majority sometimes (as if in derision of the name) 



186 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

call yourselves, to postpone this new experiment on 
finance ; dispose of it at once for this year, because 
it stands in the way of a constitutional reform, on 
which, by your own admission, depends all your 
hope of liberty. Do this, or take the consequences. 
If you now refuse to act, when you have the undoubted 
power to redeem your pledges, so often and solemnly 
given, the people of this country will believe that 
all your promises and professions were not the 
promptings of patriotism, but rather the hollow and 
selfish artifices of a shallow hypocrisy. However 
uncharitable some gentlemen might deem such a 
conclusion to be, in my judgment it would be most 
reasonable and just. Our conduct admits of no other 
explanation, if we consume the time allowed us in 
discussing the difference between two systems of 
revenue, and pass by unnoticed another subject, 
which, by our own declarations, repeated in every 
form, touches our existence as a free people. 

Sir, I might here content myself with thus ex- 
pressing my objections to the introduction of this 
bill, at this time, by the committee of which I am a 
member. I have endeavored to satisfy the House 
that the necessary bills, without the passage of which 
the Government can not execute its ordinary duties 
during the year, must occupy us the entire remainder 
of the session ; and if we should possibly have any 
time not thus necessarily employed, that there are 
other matters of high and paramount national im- 
portance, which should take precedence of this. But 
there is another objection resting with great weight 



ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 187 

on my mind, which I can not forbear to press upon 
the attention of gentlemen before I take my seat. 
I allude to the Compromise Act, as it is familiarly 
called, of March, 1833. If I am right in my con- 
ceptions of the true character of that law, we are 
not only forbidden to legislate in the way now^ pro- 
posed at this time, but that we can not so legislate 
until after the 30th of June, 1842, without such sac- 
rifice of honor and implied faith as would make a 
bandit blush. 

I shall not pretend that Congress has not the power 
to alter essentially, or, if it will, abolish the law fixing 
the rates of duties on a scale of gradual reduction 
from 1833 up to 1842 ; but I deny the right of Con- 
gress to do so, unless impelled by some dire neces- 
sity, over which it can exert no control. War, that 
greatest of all the ills that can befall a well-governed 
people, might present a case of such necessit}^ JSTo 
such necessity is pretended. 'No gentleman here will 
risk his character for sanity, by rising in his place 
and declaring that, without a law like that on your 
table, the liberties or happiness of the people are in 
danger. No man, here or elsewhere, can pretend 
that the Compromise Act of the 2d of March, 1833, 
contains any principle which menaces the general 
welfare of the country, or that its operation and 
efifects threaten our national prosperity with immi- 
nent danger. On the contrary, sir, the echoes of that 
general note of acclaim, which reverberated from one 
extremity of the Union to the other, at the j^assage 
of that law, are at this moment scarcely silenced. 



188 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

Our circumstances are not changed since the passage 
of that law, in any way connected with its provisions 
or policy. Hence I infer that, as that law, in its 
terms, fixes the measure of protection which shall be 
extended to domestic manufactures up to the year 
1842, and as it was considered in the light of an 
arrangement, permanent up to that time, by the 
Congress who enacted it; and, further, as it was so 
regarded by both the friends and foes of the pro- 
tective system, all over the country, and as those 
engaged in manufacturing shaped their business, and 
disposed their capital, in conformity to this general 
opinion, although you have the power, you have no 
right now to annul your understood engagement, 
when by so doing, a capital and labor so great as to 
produce three hundred millions a year, wdiich have 
been invested under the faith thus pledged, must be 
at once destroyed. By altering essentially, as you 
propose to do, the act of 1833, you bring upon this 
labor and capital what is equal to destruction ; you 
sever them by violence from their present business 
connections, and leave them to the mercy of accident 
for future occupation. I beg gentlemen to turn to 
the law of 1833, and see how all the features of a 
compact and permanent engagement are carefully 
impressed upon it. 

The first section, taking up the protected articles, 
or such as paid a duty above twenty per centum ad 
valorem, subjects them to a scale of gTadual reduction 
from 1833, until all are brought down to a duty of 
twenty per centum ad valorem in 1842. AA^hy were 



ox THE SUEPLUS EEVENUE. 189 

the several periodical reductions adjusted so carefully 
througli a period of nine years, if the law was not 
expected to continue in force for that length of time ? 
Let any gentleman reflect on the history of that law 
for a moment, and he can have no further difficulty 
in finding the princij^les of a permanent com2:)romise 
in it. Two great parties, as we all know, existed in 
the country. These were known by the designations 
of tariff and anti-tariff. The anti-tariff party, chiefly 
comprised in the Southern and South-western sections 
of the Union, demanded an abandonment of the pro- 
tective principle, and a reduction of duties to a reve- 
nue standard alone. They alleged, that as they were 
consumers, and not producers of those articles which 
were protected by law, they paid to the producer (in 
the protective duty) a bounty upon his labor; and 
insisted on the injustice of thus taxing the planting 
States for the benefit of the Northern manufacturing 
States. Such was the argument on one side, whether 
correct or not, I shall not here pause to consider. On 
the other side, those friendly to the protective system 
alleged that the policy of protection was begun early 
in the history of the Government; that especially 
since 1816 it had been pursued with such vigor and 
constancy as not only to invite capital but actually to 
impel it into the business of domestic manufacture. 
They insisted, and with the most obvious reason, 
that to withdraw suddenly that protection would 
result in ruin to the capitalists, and wide-spread 
misery to the laboring classes. They proposed a 
system of gradual reduction of duties, which would 



190 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

give time for the acquisition of skill, so as to enable 
them to operate with little or no protection, or, at the 
worst, (if time were given,) a gradual and compara- 
tively harmless withdrawal of their capital and labor 
from manufacturing pursuits could be effected. To 
this proposition the South acceded, and its substance 
will be found embodied in the law of 1833. Thus 
gradual reduction, extending through a series of years 
to 1842, saved the manufacturer, while the prospect- 
ive reduction of duties on all j^rotected articles to one 
standard satisfied the principles contended for by the 
South. When this was settled, to make it binding 
and irrevocable till 1842, the parties inserted in the 
third section of the bill their solemn declaration to 
that effect. The section referred to reads as follows : 
" And be it further enacted, That until the 30th day 
of June, one thousand eight hundred and forty-two, 
the duties imposed by existing laws, as modified by 
this act, shall remain and continue to be collected." 
Could your language furnish words more emphatic- 
ally expressive of a declaration by Congress that no 
change was to be made in this branch of your reve- 
nue system till June, 1842? Did you then expect 
your people to place no reliance on what you thus 
solemnly proclaimed as your determination? JSTo; 
you did not expect the American people to treat you 
as hollow-hearted knaves, attempting to imj^ose on 
their credulity. The sole object of proclaiming to 
them the unalterable character of the law of 1833 
was to quiet the fearful agitation that then every- 
where prevailed, and give stability to that interest — 



ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 191 

the manufacturing interest — which was most to be 
affected by your acts. What, sir, were the happy, 
the glorious effects of that compromise ? The day 
before that law received the President's approval was 
overcast with the gathering cloud of civil war, deep- 
ening, spreading, and blackening every hour. The 
ground on which we stood seemed to heave and quake 
with the first throes of a convulsion, that was to rend 
in fragments the last republic on earth ; at this fear- 
ful moment an overruling Providence revealed the 
instrument of its will in the person of one man, whose 
virtues would have illustrated the brightest annals 
of recorded time. He produced this gTeat measure 
of concord, and the succeeding morning dawned upon 
the American horizon without a spot ; the sun of that 
day looked down and beheld us a tranquil and united 
people. 

Are we prepared now to break the bonds of peace, 
and renew the war ? I have said you have the power 
to do so, but I deny your right. I do not measure 
that right by the standard of law in a municipal 
court. I can not conceive any idea more ridiculous 
or contemptible than that which finds no standard of 
moral or political duties and rights, for a Christian, a 
private gentleman, or a statesman, except that which 
is applicable to a contest before a justice's court or a 
nhi ^9r/»5 jury. 'No, sir, I appeal to a law in the 
bosom of man, prior and paramount to this. I appeal 
to the South, where I know that law will be obeyed, 
and where I know I do not appeal in vain. I invoke 
its characteristic chivalry. I call for that sentiment 



192 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

of manly pride which is its offspring. I summon to 
my aid that sensitive honor which feels "a stain like 
a wound," which abhors deception, and shudders at 
violated faith. Will that South, which I am sure I 
have truly described, join in this odious infraction of 
its own treaty, and unite in this miserable war upon 
the laboring thousands who have confided in its secu- 
rities — a war not waged with open force and strong 
hand — a war not waged to avenge insulted honor, but 
to recover the difference between five and ten cents 
duty upon a yard of cotton goods ? Your approach to 
this battle is not heralded by the trumpet's voice ; 
no, you are to take the proposed bill, and go on a 
marauding expedition, by way of reprisal. You are 
to steal into the dwelling of the poor, and boldly cap- 
ture a mechanic's dinner ! You are to march into the 
cottage of the widow, and fearlessly confiscate the 
breakfast of a factory girl, for the benefit of the plant- 
ing and grain-growing States of this mighty republic! 
Such are the motives for this war, and such are to be 
the trophies of its victories. How little do they who 
have presented such arguments as these, in this 
report, know of the character of the people of the 
South and West ! They vainly imagine that the high- 
minded sons of the South have drank of the fatal cup 
of the sorceress, and, like the companions of Ulysses, 

"Lost their upright shape, 
And downward fell into the groveling swine." 

The great grain-growing States of the West are 
informed, in this report, that they may reclaim a 



ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 193 

part of the tribute which, it is told them, they have 
been paying without equivalent, if they will agree to 
this bill. Let me tell the gentlemen, that the West 
must first be satisfied they are free in honor to obey 
this call. The hardy race that has subdued the 
forests of the West, and in their green youth have 
constructed monuments of their enterprise that shall 
survive the pyramids, is not likely, from merely 
sordid motive, to join in inflicting a great evil on 
any portion of our common country. The fearless 
pioneers of the West, whose ears are as familiar 
with the sharp crack of the Indian's rifle, and his 
wild war-whooj) at midnight, as are those of your 
city dandies with the dulcet notes of the harp and 
piano, they, sir, are not the men to act upon selfish 
calculations and sinister inducements. They hold 
their rights by law, and they believe that compacts, 
expressed or implied, arising fi-om individual en- 
gagements or public law, are to be kept and defended 
with their lives, if need be — not to be broken at will, 
or regarded as the proper sport of legislative or 
individual caprice. 

Mr. Speaker, we have heard much of late that is 
new to us, if not alarming, on this subject of legisla- 
tive compact. From authorities of no mean consid- 
eration we have heard it boldly preached that the 
validity of a compact arising out of law is an exploded 
paradox. It is represented as a relic of "old times," 
and we are told that it is inconsistent with the 
liberties of the people. The liberties of the peoj^le! 
It was to establish "the liberties of the people," that 
13 



194 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

Robespierre and his infamous associates preached 
tlie same doctrine to the dekided and frantic popuhice 
of France. Is the American government now to 
adopt this creed of political faith? How long is it 
since we were about to wage war with France for 
refusing to fulfill a treaty which, in the language of 
our Constitution, was nothing more than "the 
supreme law of the land?" For this we were 
ready to launch our thunders upon the seas, and arm 
our whole population for the contest on the land. 
We required the proud monarch of the most warlike 
nation of modern times to humble himself before the 
offended majesty of "public law." It is for a supposed 
violation of "public law" that your armies have been 
alternately hunting after, and flying before, the fierce 
Oceola, for a whole year, through the lagoons and 
hommocks of Florida. It is not to be supposed that 
a people, thus acting, can be brought to disregard 
like obligations, whether contracted by express or 
implied compact, with its own citizens. 

I hope, sir, I shall be pardoned for dwelling, it 
may be, somewhat too long upon this topic, I must 
now call the attention of the House for a few moments 
to what I deem a singular phenomenon in our history, 
as set forth in the report on your table. It is said 
that the planting and grain-growing States have, 
since 1789, paid to the manufacturers of this 
country about three hundred and fifty millions of 
dollars, for which they have received no equivalent. 
Sir, if this be true, since the Israelites were required 
by the Egyptian tyrant to make bricks without 



ox THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 195 

straw, there is no parallel to such monstrous op- 
pression. 

I have already stated that I will not pretend to 
quote the precise language of the report, I am sure 
it is stated that duties on imported articles to the 
amount of six hundred and eighty-two millions of 
dollars, beside thirty millions for its collection, have 
been paid since the year 1789. It is also stated in 
the report, that more than one-half of this aggregate 
had been levied on protected articles. The whole 
scope of the report labors to prove that this duty on 
protected articles is a grievous and oppressive tax on 
consumption, for which no equivalent is received in 
return. Connected wdth these positions, the author 
of the report endeavors to show that the planting 
and grain-growing portions of the Union were, and 
are, the consumers, and the few Northern manufac- 
turing States the producers, of the protected articles ; 
that the former are the payers, and the latter the 
receivers, of the duties ; which duties are represented 
as a mere bounty to the labor of the North, for 
which the South and West never have been, and, in 
the nature of things, never can be, reimbursed. Sir, 
I shall not now trouble the House, nor my fi'iends, 
who put forward this fact as a truth proved by figures 
and tabular statements, wdth any argument opposed 
to it, but I must be allowed to advert to it as a 
Western man with feelings of pride. At the same 
time, I must, in common with others, labor under 
some doubts of the fact asserted, arising out of the 
know^n history of the last twenty or thirty years. 



196 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

If the West and South-west have paid their due 
proportion of this unjust and unrcmunerated tax of 
three hundred and fifty millions within the last forty 
years, while, at the same time, they have, as the 
world knows, conquered the savages who possessed 
the Avhole Western and South-western territory, 
cleared the thick forests which overshadowed it; in 
short, if that portion of the United States has, in 
less than half a century, as all admit, reached a 
point of imj^rovement in wealth and arts which other 
times and people required ages to achieve, then, I 
say, I may with pride and confidence challenge the 
whole world, within the period of authentic history, 
to parallel the wonderful people which I have the 
honor, in part, to re|3resent. 

But, ]Mr. Speaker, sober reality and stubborn facts 
compel me to repress this exultation at our fancied 
superiority; modesty compels me to doubt whether 
truth places us so far above common mortality as this 
report has done. Facts, known facts, those unaccom- 
modating things that ruin so many beautiful inven- 
tions of fertile and ingenious minds, are constantly 
thrusting themselves before, and in the way of, the 
figures and philosophy of the gentleman who has 
labored in this report to push by them, and drive 
over them, to reach his favorite conclusions. You 
will observe, Mr. Speaker, that we are told of the 
"treasuries other than those of the United States," 
into which this enormous tribute of three hundred 
and fifty millions has been poured. In the same 
connection you hear of the "princely establishments" 



ox THE SURPLUS EEVEXUE. 197 

that have been reared up and sustained by it. The 
"princely establishments" are in the Northern man- 
ufacturing States. The "princes" to whom the 
tribute is paid are the people of this happy, favored 
region. Where, sir, are the poor oppressed tributa- 
ries, according to this report? ^\Tiy, sir, in that 
sinking, ruined, wasted wilderness, the West! 

The author of this report, under the influence of a 
too fervid imagination, has spurned the shackles and 
broken through the embarrassments arising from 
facts connected with the scheme of his theory. He 
represents the JSTorthern manufacturing States as 
another imperial Rome, seated on her seven hills, 
rioting in the luxuries of the despoiled and im- 
jDoverished South, her treasuries bursting with the 
enormous wealth poured into them from the ravaged 
and desolated provinces of the West. Manufactm-ing 
is pictured as the finger of Midas, turning ever}'- 
thing it touches into gold, while it would seem that 
gTowing gTain and planting cotton brought only taxa- 
tion without equivalent, poverty, and unrequited toil. 
Sir, if all this were true, what would follow? The 
people of this country, however they may be excelled 
b}^ other nations in the walks of letters and the polite 
arts, are known to be shrewd and well-informed, 
touching their own pecuniary interests. Such a 
people would be found rushing into the maniifactur- 
ing districts, to reap harvests of wealth, and wallow 
in monopolies that drained every other portion of the 
Union to swell their accumulation. Such a people 
would be found to shun, as a land of pestilence and 



198 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

death, the agricultural region, where nothing awaited 
them but taxation, and consequent poverty. Sir, I 
regret that fact, and the truths of history compel me 
to spoil the beautiful theories and exact calculations 
of this admirable report; but, sir, truth, however 
unwelcome, will be found, at last, the safest guide, in 
wandering through the labyrinths of speculation and 
theory. What, sir, is the fact? Wliy, for thirty 
years the tide of emigration has been from this very 
land of wealth, and not to it. The exodus has been 
from the land of promise, to the house of bondage. 
The shrewd Yankees have been flying from wealth, 
and ease, and monopoly, in their own country, to this 
very oppressed grain and cotton-raising region of the 
West, seeking taxation, oppression, and want! For 
these last three years, as every American (except 
the authors of this report) well knows, population 
from the Northern States has been plowing its way 
through the ice of the IS'orthern lakes, and bursting- 
over the mountains, till the roads and rivers are 
literally choked with its masses. Where are these 
colonists going? To the West, to raise grain, and be 
taxed! To the South-west, to grow cotton, and be- 
come poor! Such is the reasoning of the report. 
Now, I beg to know whether it is not taxing our good 
nature quite too far to ask us to believe, and act upon, 
ingenious theories, and long columns of figures, stand- 
ing, as they do, opposed to facts, admitted, known, 
and understood, by every man in this Union over 
twenty-one years of age. To come to the conclusion 
at which the report has arrived, we are required to 



ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 199 

admit that man is blind to, and careless of, his own 
personal advantage. Nay, more ; the authors of this 
report require you to deny to our American race the 
common instinct of all animal creation. The phi- 
losophy of this report teaches that man shuns ease, 
and desires toil; that he hates pleasure, and loves 
pain; that he eschews wealth, and courts poverty; 
that he flies from power, and seeks subjection. All 
this jumble of contradictions we are required to 
admit as self-evident truths, simply to explain exist- 
ing facts in a way not to contradict this erudite 
treatise on trade and finance. 

Mr. Speaker, I know it is impudent to obtrude 
our crude notions upon those to whom, from their 
position, we are taught to look for the lessons of 
wisdom ; but I hope I may be allowed to inquire of 
the majority of the "Ways and Means," whether it 
had not been better had they reviewed slightly their 
philosophical reading, before they sat down to the 
arduous task of writing the production now before 
us ? Had they turned to the pages of Bacon, with 
which I am sure they must be familiar, they w^ould 
have found a maxim which, since the days of the 
great author of the " inductive philosoj^hy," has 
never been disregarded. I think, if my memory 
is not at fault, it teaches that in all our researches 
after truth, we must reason ^^ex prceconcessis aid ex 
prcecognitisy For the benefit of my unlettered 
Western friends, I am bound to render myself in- 
telligible, by giving it in their own mother tongue. 
I will not be responsible for accuracy, but I am sure 



200 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

I shall not mistake the substance. The rule simply 
requires us always to reason from facts previously 
admitted, or previously known to exist. 

Had this rule been observed, the authors of this 
report might have remembered that the ojopressive 
tax on the cotton grower, j^aid in the shaj^e of duties, 
was in some measure repaid him by a market for 
350,000 bales of his cotton in this country every 
year, which market he could not have without the 
tax. It might have occurred to them, that the 
grower of grain, who paid his proportion of the duty 
on protected articles, was not so badly oif, since he 
found, in those "princely establishments" spoken of, 
a market for his flour, pork, and beef, which, without 
these establishments furnishing a market, might have 
rotted on his hands. They might have thought the 
immense emigration to, and vast improvements of, 
the West were facts worth attention, in ascertaining 
whether that West was oppressed by the tariff, in a 
way too grievous to be borne. Far be it fi'om me to 
assert, sir, that these facts would have puzzled the 
gentlemen ; I only mean to say, sir, that vulgar and 
coarse minds would have been better satisfied with 
the report had some notice been taken of them. 

Before I take leave of the subject, I wish to notice 
a few other difficulties which oppose the consideration 
of this bill at this time, and which spring from a 
source that will not be disregarded by the majority 
of this House. It will be seen that the bill proposes 
a reduction of our income, within the next eighteen 
months, of seven millions. A very considerable por- 



ox THE SURPLUS EEYENUE. 201 

tion of this reduction falls on the receipts of the 
present year. The question I ask here is this : Can 
the treasury bear this curtailment of its resources 
now? To answer this, I appeal to an authority 
which, for these last two years, has never been ques- 
tioned or doubted by the gentlemen who present this 
bill to the House. I allude to the annual report of 
the Secretary of the Treasury, made on the 6th of 
December last. 

The receipts into the treasury, from all sources, 
during 1837, are estimated at $24,000,000. I quote 
the very language of the report. Grentlemen will 
find I am right, by reference to Document No. 2 of 
this session, page 4. After enumerating the various 
sources (such as customs, public lands, etc.) from 
which this amount is derived, the Secretary proceeds 
to compute the amount of expenditures for the present 
year. I shall give his own language, from the same 
document, page 5 : 

"The expenditures for all objects, ordinary and 
extraordinary, in 1837, including the contingent of 
only $1,000,000 for usual excesses in appropriations, 
beyond the estimates, are computed at $66,755,831, 
provided the unexpended appropriation at the end 
of this and the next year remain about equal." 

Here gentlemen will see that, instead of reducing 
the revenue down to the wants of the Government, 
our income, from all sources, in 1837, falls short of 
our expenditures, as estimated, nearly $3,000,000. 
If the Secretary is right, (and will the gentlemen 
of the majority be so bold as to say he is wrong ?) 



202 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

then the effort shoukl be to increase the taxes, to 
raise the revenue up to the actual wants of the 
Government. And, sir, if it were not for the five 
millions, which are kept in reserve for extraordinary 
demands on the treasury by the deposit bill of last 
year, according to the calculations of Mr. Woodbury, 
we should be compelled now to increase the duties 
on foreign merchandise during the present year, or 
borrow money to meet the demands on the treasury. 
Let us see what the Secretary further says, on page 5 
of the same report. I again quote his own words : 

" From these calculations, it will be seen that, if 
the outstanding appropriations, unexpended at the 
close of 1837, be as large as at the close of 1836, and 
the other expenditures should agree with the above 
estimates, they would exceed the computed revenue 
accruing from all sources nearly $3,000,000, or suffi- 
cient to absorb more than half of that part of the 
present surplus which is not to be deposited with the 
several States. But if these outstanding appropria- 
tions, at the close of 1837, should be much less than 
those in 1836, as is probable, or should the accruing 
receipts be much less, or the appropriations made 
for 1837 be much larger than the estimates, a call 
will become necessary for a portion of the surplus 
deposited with the States, though it will not probably 
become necessary, except in one of those events." 

In the extract I have read, the Secretary has quite 
distinctly told us that the probability is we shall not 
only absorb all the accruing revenue, and the five 
millions not deposited with the States, by the expen- 



ox THE SURPLUS EEYEXUE. 203 

clitiires of 1837, but that the States will be called on 
to repay a portion of the money deposited with them, 
to meet the wants of the Government durino- the 
present year. How, sir, does the policy of reducing 
the revenue, as proposed in this bill, agree with this 
state of things ? Pass the bill, sir, and in eighteen 
months, it is said, you will save in the j^ockets of the 
peoj^le seven millions, which w^ould otherwise be 
drawn from them by the laws now in force. And, 
in the same time, if you place any confidence in the 
Secretary of the Treasury, you will be compelled to 
take from the peoj^le of the States (who are to have 
the use of the money deposited with, them) an equal 
amount, if not more. What a miserable piece of 
bungling jugglery would this be ! You simply take 
seven millions out of one pocket of the peoi)le and 
put it into the other, and gravely tell them you have 
saved to them seven millions of money by the process. 
Sir, the people of the States are not to be thus de- 
ceived. Let them look to this measure and its sure 
results. It is designed to bring about a state of 
things which will compel a call on them for the 
surplus revenue deposited with them, and which I 
am happy to see their legislatures are using to the 
general advantage of their constituents. 

But it is possible, the friends of the Secretary will 
tell me his conjectures and calculations are not to be 
relied on. Shall I receive that answer from the 
gentlemen composing* the majority here? Whose 
authority is it that is thus to be contemned? The very 
man whose behests have been laws to the committee 



204: SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

of Ways and Means ever since I have had the 
honor to be one of them. Sir, I have observed that 
it has been thought by that committee not only 
unwise, but even contumacious, factious, rebellious, 
to oppose any demand or to doubt any view taken by 
the Secretary of the Treasury, Nay, sir, I have 
thought sometimes that his friends on that com- 
mittee considered it conclusive evidence of essential 
vulgarity ; it was proof with them that a man had 
not seen "good society," if he presumed to question 
the propriety of any estimate or any requisition com- 
ing from that high and responsible source. So pre- 
valent w^ere these opinions, that I fear I have some- 
times yielded my assent to appropriations, merely to 
preserve my character for "gentility" with the '-^ limit 
^^o?^," wdio compose the majority here, as they do in the 
committee of which I am a member. How is it, then, 
that we are now to dismiss all regard to the sugges- 
tions of this officer ? Has not the President certified 
to you that he has discharged his duty with great 
ability and great fidelity? Do we not hear his friends 
everywhere extolling him to the skies for a prodigy 
of financial wisdom? Did not the President select 
him for his great and comprehensive knowledge of 
that most perplexing of all sciences — political econ- 
omy ; for his large and accurate acquaintance with 
the channels of trade and the sources of national 
wealth ? Surely no one of the majority will doubt 
this. Now, sir, what respect is paid to his opinions, 
his "official opinions," by the bill and report on your 
table ? True, it can not be denied, for the President 



ox THE SURPLUS EEYEXUE. 205 

has said it is so, that he has discharged his duty with 
fidelity. Is it not unkind, then, in his own friends, 
his "ministering servants" of the Ways and Means, 
to treat his hibors with such cruel inditference ? See 
him day and night watching the various currents of 
trade that bring wealth to the people, and revenue to 
the Treasury ; sacrificing his ease and health to those 
" thoughts which waste the marrow and consume the 
brain ;" year after year denying himself, with stoical 
fortitude, the gayeties of this most refined and fash- 
ionable cit}'', brooding with ceaseless and anxious 
care over the Treasury, if not the treasure, he sits 
like "sad Prometheus fastened to his rock." And 
now, sir, as if they were determined that this Titan 
of the Treasury should realize the fate of this proto- 
type of old, his ancient friends, it seems, by some 
magical change, turn tormentors, and are prepared 
to thrust their vulture-beaks into his liver, and, with 
remorseless voracity, devour his flesh, without ever 
terminating his pain. Sir, to drop figure, and speak 
in plain prosaic English, this bill asks you to treat 
every opinion of the present Secretary as stupid non- 
sense, and take as infallible truth the conjectures of 
this report in their stead. I ask the friends of the 
Secretary if they are prepared for this ; if not, they 
will vote with me to postpone the bill. 

Let it be remembered that the Secretary of the 
Treasury, whose views are diametrically opj)osed to 
the passage of any law looking to a reduction of the 
revenue, has given his opinions only a month ago. 
Surely he has not changed all his notions respecting 



206 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

our probable receipts in 1837 since he published his 
last report ! I should be glad if my colleague, [Mr. 
Hamer,] who told us the other day "he had lately 
been behind the curtain," would inform us whether, 
among other precious secrets, he had heard anything 
of a total change of the Secretary's opinions on this 
subject, within the last few weeks. 

Mr. Speaker, if the gentlemen who have brought 
forward this measure have emancipated themselves 
from all respect for the opinions and recommenda- 
tions of your chief of finance — a respect bordering 
heretofore on absolute submission to his will — a little 
attention to documents emanating from a quarter still 
more venerated, will exhibit them in an attitude of 
still more exalted independence. They are, however, 
(if I may be pardoned a conjecture so uncharitable,) 
scarcely entitled to a position so enviable as that 
of self-relying and self-resolved freedom of action. 
Something of the dross of selfishness, unhappily for 
poor humanity, mingles in the composition of the 
purest motives, and stains the glory of the most 
sublime achievements. The committee have, I fear, 
betrayed something too much of a quality, or to 
speak phrenologically, an organ, of combativeness. 
They have not only spurned all the trammels of pre- 
cedent, and despised all the opinions of the Secretary 
of the Treasury, but determined that paradox should, 
in themselves at least, have the merit of originality. 
They have set at naught, nay, scorned, the solemn 
injunctions of the President himself. Thus, they 
may be said to stand " alone in their glory." Sir, we 



ox THE SURrLUS REVENUE. 207 

have heard much of Greneral Jackson's system of 
administration. If any meaning is to be attached to 
this word "system," which can stand against the 
arbitrary dictation of party, it will be admitted that 
it implies a plan which comprehends an order of pro- 
ceeding by principles extending over the time, at 
least, of a Presidential term. In this view, we can 
at once see how great principles are as true and 
applicable in practice in 1837 as they were in 1836. 
This being admitted, let us see how the bill and 
report now before us harmonize with the doctrines on 
the same subject, expressed in strong and earnest 
advice to Congress, in the President's message a year 
ago. I quote the entire passage from the message 
of 1836: 

"Should Congress make new appropriations, in 
conformity with the estimates which will be sub- 
mitted from the proper departments, amounting to 
about twenty-four millions, still the available surj^lus, 
at the close of the next year, after deducting all unex- 
pended appropriations, will probably not be less than 
six millions. This sum can, in my judgment, be now 
usefully applied to proposed improvements in our 
navy-yards, and to new national works, which are not 
enumerated in the present estimates, or to the more 
rapid completion of those already begun. Either 
would be constitutional and useful, and would render 
unnecessary any attempt, in our present peculiar con- 
dition, to divide the surplus revenue, or to reduce it 
any faster than will be effected by the existing 
laws. In any event, as the annual report from the 



208 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

Secretary of the Treasury will enter into details show- 
ing the probability of some decrease in the revenue 
during the next seven years, and a very considerable 
deduction in 1842, it is not recommended that Con- 
gress should undertake to modify the present tariff so 
as to disturb the principles on which the Compromise 
Act was passed. Taxation on some of the articles of 
general consumption, which are not in competition 
with our own productions may be, no doubt, so dimin- 
ished as to lessen, to some extent, the source of this 
revenue ; and the same object can also be assisted by 
more liberal provisions for the subjects of public 
defense, which, in the present state of our prosperity 
and wealth, may be expected to engage your atten- 
tion. If, however, after satisfying all the demands 
which can arise from these sources, the unexpended 
balance in the Treasury should still continue to 
increase, it w^ould be better to bear with the evil until 
the great changes contemplated in our tariff laws 
have occurred, and shall enable us to revise the sys- 
tem with that care and circumspection which are due 
to so delicate and important a subject." 

Here gentlemen will perceive that the bill and 
re2)ort are at war with the President's opinion, 
solemnly expressed, on the same subject. Mark, 
however, the terms employed to designate the act 
of 1833; he calls it the "Compromise Act." As he 
anticipates a considerable reduction in our revenue 
during the next seven years, and especially in 1842, 
he warns us "not to disturb the principles on which 
the Compromise Act of 1833 was passed." Spoken 



ox THE SURPLUS REVEXUE. 209 

like a man sensible of the obligations of legislative 
and j^i^i^lic faith! Sentiments worthy the chief 
magistrate of a nation governed by law, whose duty 
it is to see the obligations of law faithfully observed ! 
He speaks familiarly of the "j)rinciples" upon which 
the Compromise Act was passed. What does he 
mean by the '-principles" of that act? JNTothing else 
than these mutual stipulations by the great contend- 
ing parties to that compact, providing for a stable, 
fixed rate of duties, which should remain, as the act 
itself expresses it, till June, 1842. The bill disregards 
the principles, or rather violates and destroys the 
principles, on which the Compromise Act was passed. 
The report, instead of anticipating a reduction of 
revenue by the laws now in force, goes about facili- 
tating that reduction by legislating in a way contrary 
to the whole tenor of the President's opinion which 
I have quoted. Sir, I call on the chairman of the 
Ways and Means to say when, before now, he has 
ventured on a system of policy not approved by the 
"speech fi'om the throne." I ask him why he did 
not bring forward this bill last year, when every 
possible expedient was resorted to to get rid of a 
surplus, which was about to go to the States, as it 
did go, under a law so odious to the Prince Regent, 
who is to mount the throne the 4th of the coming 
March? A bill reducing the revenue then would 
have saved the troubles and dangers of a deposit with 
the States. That was the time, if ever, to have urged 
its passage. Since the surplus has gone to the 
States, no reason exists for reduction. Do not gen- 
14 



210 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

tlcmen see that a most uncharitable view may 
plausibly be taken of their course? It will be said, 
that as the President had forbidden you to disturb 
the Compromise, and at that time had a year of his 
reign remaining, in which his power of reward and 
punishment could be exerted, you then dare not 
incur his displeasure ; but now, when only six weeks 
of that reign are left, to be spent in the languor of 
convalescence, or it may be in the agony of pain, you 
may treat the opinions of your old chief with con- 
tempt, relying on the sure protection of the Executive 
elect. Of the chairman of the Ways and Means, 
(whom, if I may not number among my friends, I 
can not call my foe,) I fear it may be said that his 
eye has been so dazzled by the glitter of expected 
coronets, under the new reign, that he has lost sight 
of all regard for the principles and authority of that 
which is now almost numbered with the past. 
"High-reaching Buckingham grows circumspect." 
What a striking exhibition is here of the emj^tiness 
and vanity of earthly renown and mere human power! 
But yesterday, and, like the mighty first Csesar, 
"the word of Andrew Jackson might have stood 
against the world," and now, "none so poor as to do 
him reverence." Deserted by all his old and faithful 
followers, abandoned by those adoring crowds of self- 
styled democrats, I alone, an obscure and derided 
aristocrat, from the far West, as our nomenclature 
has it, I alone stand by the desolate old man, vindi- 
cating his opinions, and stemming, as I best can, that 
torrent of contempt poured out by his own former 



ox THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 211 

friends, which is likely to pursue and overwhelm him 
in his retreat from the scene of his glory. 

How are we to account for this singular event? 
Singular indeed it is, apj^arently, but really what 
was to be looked for. Politicians who belong to what 
I may denominate, for the sake of distinction, the 
school of idolatry, do not worship the setting, but 
always the rising sun. No sooner, therefore, do we 
see the level beams of the retiring hero's setting orb 
begin to melt into the twilight, than, as we might 
expect, the thick crowds turn wistfully to a dubious 
and uncertain dawn in an opposite quarter of the 
heavens. With characteristic fitfulness it now shoots 
a gleam of faint light above the horizon, and anon 
withdraws it from sight. At last, "half concealed, 
half disclosed," it rises on the world, and hither the 
multitudes repair to "worship and adore." 

Thus, and thus only, can we account, sir, for those 
eccentric movements and strange contradictions 
which crowd themselves into the annals of the little 
and great aspirants after the perishable honors of this 
world; and this bill we are to receive as the first 
offering upon the altars erected to our new divinity. 
It is in this way our new sovereign will signalize the 
beginning of his reign. He will destroy, in the first 
year, three hundred millions of property, all for the 
good of his loving subjects; and, with the blessing 
of God, which may be most reasonably expected to 
attend so beneficent a work, proceeding at this rate, 
he will succeed, in his reign of four years, in destroy- 
ing twelve hundred millions of the nation's propert}^ 



212 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

Thus will our excellent democratic Government enable 
our people to feel the force of that consoling declara- 
tion of Scripture, "blessed are the poor." 

Mr. Speaker, I should be happy to spare myself 
the pain which it always gives me to recur to former 
transactions in a way likely to excite unpleasant feel- 
ings; but I have the misfortune to differ with the 
majority of a committee of which I am a member; 
I am therefore compelled, in self-defense, to give 
every reason in my power for the course my con- 
science impels me to jDursue. 

The House are already apprized that the bill on 
the table presupposes a surplus of revenue as certain 
to accrue within the next eighteen months. The ex- 
istence of this surplus is the evil the bill is intended 
to prevent. Whether this apprehended surplus will 
accrue is matter of opinion. I wish, then, to present 
another, and only one other, document, to show the 
reliance to be placed upon the opinions of that very 
majority of the Ways and Means, who now require 
us, on the faith of their opinion and conjecture 
merely, to pass this bill. Many gentlemen will 
remember that various projects for the disposition of 
the surplus revenue were referred to this same com- 
mittee, composed of the same persons last year 
which now compose it. On the 1st of July, 1836, 
just before the close of the last session, and only 
about six months ago, a report was made from which 
I propose to read an extract. It will be seen by this 
extract what were the opinions of the committee 
then, as to any surplus which might possibly come 



ox THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 213 

into the Treasury, and also their prognostics as to 
the probability of such an event happening at all. 

After disposing of a variety of topics, and review- 
ing our past history, as usual, complaining with 
becoming indignation of bad currency in England 
and America, and deploring the existence of an evil 
spirit of speculation, notwithstanding the late death 
of the United States Bank, the report concludes as 
follows : 

"Our revenue from customs and public lands, 
after 1837, is not likely to exceed the expenditures 
of Grovernment. It is, therefore, important that, 
whatever surplus we may have in the meantime, 
whether deposited with the local banks or in the 
State treasuries, as is jiroposed after the 1st of 
January next, should be preserved, to be applied 
to the extraordinary purposes we have been com- 
pelled to provide for during this session, and for 
similar expenditures, which, in the present state of 
our Indian relations, may again become necessary. 
On the balance in the treasury on the 1st of January 
next, and the revenue which may be received in 
1837, there will be charged, in addition to the current 
exj^enditures of that year, and all extraordinary de- 
mands that may occur, probably near fifteen millions 
for appropriations authorized at the present session, 
making the claims upon the treasury in the next 
year greater than in the j^resent, while the revenue 
of 1837 will be considerably less than that of 1836, 
and leaving the surplus at the close of that year 
much diminished. As our income will not proh-aMj 



214 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

then exceed our current expenditures, we must rely 
entirely upon what surplus we may have to defray 
all expenses w^iich may become necessary in extin- 
guishing Indian titles to lands, removing the tribes 
beyond the Mississii^pi, and for other subjects of 
expenditure of an extraordinary character." 

I beg the House to notice with what oracular 
gravity the prophets then uttered their predictions: 
" Our revenue from customs and public lands, after 
1837, is not likely to exceed the expenditures of 
Government." We are then kindly, but still peremp- 
torily, admonished to husband our surplus, if any, to 
meet those exigencies which every wise and consider- 
ate man should always be prepared to expect in 
human concerns. Again, at the close we are thus 
addressed: "As our income will not probably then 
exceed our current expenditures, we must rely entirely 
upon what surplus we may have to defray all the ex 
penses which may become necessary in extinguishing 
Indian titles to land," etc. So spoke the prophets six 
months since; and now, up jumps the chairman of 
the Ways and Means, "modest as Morning when 
she eyes the youthful Phoebus," and full of the same 
inspiration that burned in the bosom of the seer in 
July last ; and, in the same solemn prophetic tones, 
he tells us our income will exceed our expenditures. 
Now we are admonished not to husband any sur23lus 
we may have, but to reduce the revenue by seven 
millions in the next year and a half, so that no 
surplus whatever shall remain. 

Sir, when I see with wdiat ruthless hand the com- 



ON THE SURPLUS REVENUE. 215 

mittee has torn to pieces every shred of character, 
for either ability or fidelity, of the Secretary of the 
Treasury, and how, with the same destructive appe- 
tency, they have trampled down the authority of 
the President himself; and, lastly, when I see with 
what ridiculous gravity these two reports of the 
same committee, differing only six months in their 
ages, contradict each other, I hope the gentlemen 
will pardon the degrading analogy, but really I can 
think of nothing like them but the celebrated " cats 
of Kilkenny ; " they have at last literally swallowed 
each other. Sir, I have done with this subject. I 
know I have detained the House already too long; 
for this I must find an apology in the fact that I had 
not the most distant thought of addressing the House 
on this subject till the afternoon of yesterday. With- 
out further time for arrangement of topics, I could 
not hope to preserve that order which is so favorable 
to brevity as well as perspicuity. Let me again 
implore the House to put this subject at once at rest. 
The worst evil that can come is a surplus of a few 
rnillions; and even this the highest officer in the 
Grovernment connected with your financial system 
tells you is impossible. But if it should occur, send 
it, as you have done before, to the States, where it 
can be used as well as kept. If this surplus is an 
evil, in that way you can rid yourselves of it as 
easily as the shipwrecked apostle shook off the ser- 
pent that fastened upon his hand. At all events, let 
your people rest one year from your miserable ex- 
periments. Let your former blunders teach you 



216 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

some caution. In j^our attempt to bring about a 
gold c-urrency, you have flooded the land with bank- 
notes. In destroying the United State Bank mo- 
nopoly, you have raised up a greater monopoly in 
public lands. Now you are to try the experiment of 
breaking down what are called, in this report, the 
"princely establishments of the North." Sir, you 
will not, can not, at least now, eifect this last and 
most cruel experiment. Let us then put this bill 
quietly to sleep somewhere ; let it rest in peace till 
1842 ; then, perhaps, it may re-appear among us 
under other auspices, and with better claims to our 
regard. 



OlS" THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 

[In the House of Representatives of tlie United States, Friday, 
April 20, 1838, the House having again resumed the consideration 
of the bill making appropriations for the continuation of the Cum- 
berland Road through Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, Mr. CoRWiN 
addressed the House as follows:] 

Me. Speaker: 

I perceive the House is imusiiall}^ impatient of this 
debate. I am very reluctant, at any time, to lift up 
my voice in this Babel of confused voices, but espe- 
cially so now ; nor would I delay the final vote for a 
moment, did I not remember that this bill has been 
already once rejected, but a day or two since ; and 
from the tone of discussion this morning, I have too 
much reason to fear it will meet a similar fate by the 
vote now about to be taken. I may add, also, that I 
feel unwilling to permit the remarks of the two gen- 
tlemen from South Carolina [Mr. Clowney and Mr. 
Pickens,] to pass to the press, and from thence into 
the public mind, without an attempt, at least, to cor- 
rect the erroneous impressions in which, according to 
my views, they abound. 

The bill now under discussion, for the continuation 
of the Cumberkand Road, is nothing more nor less 
than the continuance of a system of regular annual 
expenditure, begun in 1806, and continued, with the 
excej)tion of the short period of the war with Great 

(217) 



218 SrEECIIES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

Britain, every year up to the present time. The esti- 
mates for this appropriation are as regularly and 
habitually sent in by the Treasury department, as 
are those for the salary of the President and other 
public servants, or those for the support of the army. 
If a continued perseverance in the prosecution of any 
public measure for thirty years can not be looked to 
as settling the public utility of such measure, or the 
fixed policy and duty of this Government, beyond the 
reach of cavil or objection, then, indeed, may it be 
truly said that we are a j^eople without common fore- 
thought, a Government without any established pol- 
icy, a confederacy without any common end or aim 
whatever. 

The construction of the road provided for in this 
Ijill, from the waters of the Atlantic to the Missis- 
sippi river, was originated during the administration 
of Mr. Jefferson. It has received the countenance of 
every shade and complexion of political party in Con- 
gress, at various j^eriods since, and has been sanc- 
tioned by the apj^roval of every Executive from that 
time to the present. It has thus become incorpo- 
rated with your policy. It makes a part of the creed 
of all parties, and, as it advances in its progress, is 
woven into the texture of those systems of internal 
improvement going forward in each of the six States 
through which it passes. A measure thus perse- 
veringly continued so long, sustaining itself, through 
perpetual conflicts, and every vicissitude of our his- 
tory for the last thirty years, comes recommended at 
once to the mind as something necessary — something 



ON THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 219 

which has been found indispensable, and not merely 
convenient. It stands in your policy like one of those 
truths in philosophy which is not questioned, because 
it has received the general assent of all reasonable 
men. Speaking of such a measure, this morning, the 
gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Pickens, richly 
imbued as his mind is with philological learning) 
could find no terms whereby to characterize this bill 
less odious than swindling and plunder. Then, by a 
dextrous evasion of the substance, and a strict observ- 
ance of the letter of the rules of courtesy in debate, 
the gentleman has been able, by fair inference, to 
denounce the supporters of the bill as the prompters 
of "swindling," the aiders and abettors of "plunder." 
[Here Mr. Pickens rose and observed that he had 
not applied the terms stated by Mr. Corwin to the 
bill, or those who supported it. He had stated, in 
argument, the case of a general system of taxa- 
tion, and an appropriation to partial and local 
purposes, and denominated that as swindling and 
plunder.] I understand the gentleman as he ex- 
plains himself. He has made a speech against this 
bill. He has endeavored to illustrate, in various 
ways, its iniquity and impolicy. He denounces this 
road as local in its character, and not of general 
utility. He shows that the money appropriated is a 
part of the common revenue raised from the whole 
Union. He then sj^eaks of general taxation, and 
local appropriations, and calls this last a system of 
swindling and plunder. It is but the difference 
between a positive assertion and a conclusion from 



220 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

premises stated. Sir, I desire, when thus arraigned, 
to submit my defense. If I am not mistaken, the 
gentleman will find this system, and this road, have 
been cherished and heartily supported by men, living 
and dead, to whom even he would be willing to defer 
in such matters ; and with whose memories and char- 
acter he would not associate the folly and criminality 
which, in his over-wrought zeal, he fancies he has 
discovered in this bill. 

Mr. Speaker, I do not intend to elaborate an essay 
upon this road, but I must be permitted to notice, for 
a few moments, the very summary method by which 
gentlemen with great apparent ease acquit their 
consciences of all censure for voting down now and 
forever all further appropriations of the kind. Yes- 
terday the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. 
Rhett] spoke of the supposed importance of the road 
west of Wheeling for military purposes, as an idea 
too ridiculous to merit a moment's serious thought. 
It seemed to him perfectly idle to imagine that 
ordnance or militar}' stores would ever be trans- 
ported by land westward while the Ohio river 
remained; and so, with undoubting confidence and 
the utmost self-complacency, he assures us that a 
"fool's cap and bells" should be bestowed upon any 
one who entertains a contrary opinion. Sir, I hope I 
may be allowed, with great humility, not indeed to 
deny to the conclusions of the gentleman the greatest 
certainty possible in matters of this kind, but merely 
to suggest a fact or two which it may be well to con- 
sider a moment before we swear to the infallibilitv 



ox THE CUMBEELAXD ROAD. 221 

of his judgment on this military question. In the 
hrst ph^ce, the road and river, though both runnino- 
from east to west, from Wheeling to the Mississippf 
are distant from each other, from north to south' 
from ninety to one hundred and fifty miles at various 
points. I think it possible in the chances of war that 
It might become necessary to march a military force 
directly from Wheeling to Columbus, in Ohio, or to the 
capitals of Indiana or Illinois, and to take along with 
such force a train of artillery. Would the Ohio river, 
think you, be so obliging as to leave its ancient bed,' 
and bear your cannon on its waves across the coun- 
try from Wheeling to Columbus, in Ohio, and from 
thence by Indianapolis to Spring-field, in Illinois '? If 
we could suspend the laws of the physical world 
or if a miracle could be wrought at our command' 
then the confident opinion of the gentleman, that 
this road IS, in no sense, of military importance 
would, m my poor judgment, appear somewhat plan' 
sible. But the gentleman seems also to forget that 
the waters of the Ohio, in spite of our wishes to the 
contrary, will freeze into hard ice. For three months 
111 the winter it is not, at all times, navigable. On 
account of shoals, it is not navigable at a time of low 
water m the summer. And hence it would follow 
that your military movements in that quarter, if 
ever necessary, would have to wait for the floods of 
summer, and the thaws of winter. Eut I will not 
venture to oppose any speculative notions of mine to 
an opinion so confidently entertained by several gen- 
tlemen from the South who have spoken in this 



222 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

debate. I will fortify myself by an authority which 
I am sure will command, as I know it should, infi- 
nitely more regard than any opinion or argument of 
mine. 

It wdll be remembered, Mr. S23eaker, that this 
Government, soon after the late war with Great 
Britain, admonished by the experience of that war, 
determined on prosecuting a general system of mili- 
tary defense. To this end. General Bernard w^as 
brought from France, and placed at the head of the 
Engineer corps. In the year 1824, it became the 
duty of this officer, under the direction of Mr. John 
C. Calhoun, then Secretary of War, to survey and 
report to Congress such rivers to be improved, and 
canals and roads to be constructed all over our terri- 
tory, as were conceived to be of natimial importance 
for commercial or military purposes. On the 3d of 
December, 1824, Mr. Calhoun submitted to the Presi- 
dent, and through him to Congress, the result of the 
labors of this corps, accompanied with his own reflec- 
tions and recommendations. It will be found, on 
examining that document, that this very Cumberland 
road is classed with other great works of internal 
improvement, which, in the opinion of Mr. Calhoun, 
v.'cre necessary to the defense of the country in war, 
and that the road now under the consideration of the 
House is there pronounced to be of " national import- 
ance." This was the opinion of Mr. Calhoun in 1824. 
The construction of the Cumberland road, as a work 
of commercial importance, as well as a sure means of 
binding in union the Eastern and Western portions 



ON THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 223 

of our country, had been urged upon Congress by Mr. 
Gallatin, as Secretary of the Treasury, as early as 
1803, and by Mr. Giles and Mr. John Randolj^h, of 
Virginia, in reports which they respectively sub- 
mitted to Congress about the same time. Before the 
navigation of the rivers of the West by steam, no one 
could cast his eye upon the map of the Western 
States, and not perceive at once the incalculable 
value of this road to the commerce of both East and 
West. If the application of steam to navigation has 
diminished the importance of the road, this was 
known and considered by Mr. Calhoun, when he 
made the report to which I have referred. In 1824, 
the steamboats were flying on their wings of fire from 
Pittsburg to New Orleans, as they are now ; yet Mr. 
Calhoun pronounced the Cumberland road then a 
work of " national importance." I beg the gentle- 
man from South Carolina who spoke this morning 
[Mr. Pickens] to peruse that report of his friend, 
Mr. Calhoun. I beg him to ponder well the magnifi- 
cent and expensive works of internal improvement 
there commended to the favorable regard of this 
Government. The waters of the Chesapeake and 
Ohio were to flow together. From the Ohio the chain 
was to be stretched across that State to the JN'orth- 
ern lakes, and thus the North and South are to be 
bound up together, one in their internal interests, as 
they are one and identical in their national and extra 
territorial relations. But I need Jiot particula^rize ; 
what I have specified com2:>rehends not the twentieth 
part of those works in magnitude and expense then 



224 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN". 

recommended by Mr. Calhoun as proper to be con- 
structed by the Federal Grovernment, at the expense 
of the common Treasury of the nation. 

The Cumberland road, as I have said, is one 
among the rest there recommended as of " national 
importance." Mr. Speaker, I must beg the indul- 
gence of the House to read a single paragraph from 
the document referred to. After speaking of the 
great advantages to the whole Union of one of the 
great Western works to which I have already 
adverted, the Secretary proceeds: 

"The advantages, in fact, from the completion of 
this single work, as proposed, would be so extended, 
and ramified throughout these great divisions of our 
country, already containing so large a portion of our 
population, and destined in a few generations to out- 
number the most populous States of Europe, as to 
leave in that quarter no other work for the execution 
of the General Grovernment, excepting only the ex- 
tension of the Cmnberland road from Wheeling to 
St. Louis, which is also conceived to be of national 
importance.'''' 

J^ow, Mr. Speaker, if, in the bill under discussion, 
there be any feature akin to "swindling and plunder," 
I ask the gentlemen from the South to return to that 
gigantic project of kindred works projected by their 
own justly favorite son, and tell me in what vocabu- 
lary among the "tongues of men" they can find 
epithets odious enough to shadow forth the diabolical 
tendencies of his plan. Sir, if this bill be swindling, 
his scheme is robbery. If this bill be petty plunder. 



ON THE CUMBEKLAND EOAD. 225 

his plan was wholesale desolation. But, good or bad, 
whichever it be, we have his authority for it. Well 
do I remember, sir, in what high esteem the Secre- 
tary of War [Mr. Calhoun] was held throughout the 
West in the year 1824. The sober affections of the 
aged, and the ardent hearts of the young, all, all 
were attracted to him. His altars blazed every- 
where throughout the broad valleys of the West. 
Right loyally and prodigally did we pour out our 
incense upon our shrine; and lo! what now do we 
see ? While the smoke of our sacrifice yet ascends 
in gathering clouds ; while the distended nostrils of 
our deity inhale its grateful odors almost to suffoca- 
tion ; he, in whom our affections were all enshrined ; 
he, the author of this our faith; he, the chosen object, 
it may be, of our very profane and heathenish, but 
sincere idolatry ; he, with the selected high-priests still 
of his faith, suddenly rush U2:»on us from the South, 
overturn their own altars, and scourge us, their mis- 
guided, but still honest devotees, from the temple 
themselves had erected. JSTot content with this, but 
determined, it seems, to consign both the authors 
and the followers of the creed to hopeless infamy, 
they have compared their own system of policy to a 
system of plunder, and themselves and us to a com- 
bination of swindlers. 

Let not the gentlemen from the South suppose that 
I quote the authority of Griles, and Randolph, and 
Grallatin, in 1802 and 1803, and Mr. Calhoun as late 
as 1824, to fix upon Southern gentlemen the sin of 
inconsistency, or sinister motives, for change of prin- 
15 



226 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

ciple. J^fo, this is not my motive. I wish to con- 
vince, and not to taunt the gentlemen. I wish them 
to pause upon their own present opinions, and to 
compare them witli the views of those, living and 
(lead, to whom I have referred, in the hope that in 
the light of those great minds — that light that has 
been to them "a pillar of fire by night," in all their 
political wanderings heretofore— might, haply, now 
serve to keep them in the right way. I beg the gen- 
tleman from South Carolina, [Mr. Rhett] who so 
readily voted "cap and bells" to the heads of such 
as entertained particular notions, which he con- 
demned, of the utility of this road, to take back his 
gifts a moment, and see whether he may not possibly 
be found unawares placing these badges of imbecility 
and folly on the graves of Randolph and Gfiles ; and 
whether, if he is to be impartial and just in the 
distribution of such honors, he may not be compelled 
to pass over into the chamber of the Senate, and 
bestow one set of them upon the illustrious Senator 
from his own State. Mr. Speaker, I venture to 
suggest to the gentleman from South Carolina, [Mr. 
Rhett] in a spirit of sincere respect, that there is a 
posterity for him as well as those great and good 
men whose opinions he sets at naught. I hope I may 
without offense, suppose it possible that in some 
distant day, when this very road, paved from the 
Atlantic to the Mississippi, shall be crowded with 
commerce, and groan beneath its load of travel; 
when, by the speed with which your armies can pass 
over it, from the center to the remote border of your 



ox THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 227 

country, some fearful rebellion is happily quelled, or, 
for the same reasons, some insolent foreign foe is 
speedily repulsed, the age that then is may possibly 
remove the "cap and bells" from the last resting- 
place of Giles and Randolph, where he has hung 
them, and look for the tomb of another, as better 
deserving the honor of these significant emblems. 
Sir, when I glance at the history of this road ; when 
I remember that it was begun in the administration 
of Jeiferson, and approved by him; when I group 
together the other illustrious names who have for 
thirty years also given it their sanction, I am prone 
to believe, my own judgment concurring, that I am 
right in carrying on what has been thus begun. I 
can not reverse the settled and long unquestioned 
decisions of the fathers and founders of the Republic, 
upon the faith of the last night's dream. I can not 
so readily believe that the sages of past times 
violated the Constitution to make a road. I can not 
see why, if that were so, it has not been discovered 
in the lapse of thirty years. Sir, I know much is 
said, and truly, at this day, of that advance of the 
human mind. I know, sir, it was written thus long 
ago, "Men shall go to and fro, and knowledge shall 
increase." All this I know^, and yet I can not quite 
believe that us young gentlemen here, in this year 
of grace, 1838, have now, this morning, descended to 
the bottom of the well where truth lies, as is said, 
and for the first time brought up and exj^osed her 
precious secrets to the long-anxious eyes of the in- 



228 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

quiring world. Just as slow am I, Mr. Speaker, to 
believe that the great men who gave us a country 
forty years ago, did not understand Avhat its true 
interests were. They Avho projected this great work 
were not men to rush into hasty and ill-considered 
measures. They had been accustomed to settle the 
foundations of society, and they did their work, in 
all things, under the habitual reflection and responsi- 
bility which their immortal labors inspired. Sir, let 
us beware, in the midst of our party conflicts, how 
we hastily question their calm resolves. Let us take 
care, in this day's work, with the hoarse clamor of 
party resounding ever in our ears, that we are not 
deaf to the voice of wisdom, which calls out to us 
from the past. 

Mr. Speaker, I have thus far considered the bill 
upon your table as providing for one work, itself a 
part of a system of "internal improvement." I have 
referred so far to the opinions of men whom we are 
accustomed to regard as good authority, to show that 
the road in question has been regarded as one of 
national importance, and as such, is within the 
acknowledged powers of Congress. But, sir, this 
bill rests its claims to our support ujion a basis far 
fess liable to those assaults which consider it only 
in the isolated view of expediency. It is, in truth, a 
bill for the fulfillment of a contract. It proposes to 
carry into effect a compact, to the performance of 
which the faith of this Grovernment is pledged to 
three sovereign States of this Union. I know, sir, 



ON THE CUMBEELAND ROAD. 229 

that many gentlemen here are familiar with this 
view of the subject, but I feel equally certain that 
there are others who are not. 

The gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. Pope] the 
other day discussed this branch of the subject with 
great ability, but I am impressed with the necessity 
of presenting it more at length, even at the risk of 
being tedious. I shall endeavor, by a reference to 
acts of Congress and public documents, to show that 
we are bound to construct this road as far as the 
Mississippi river ; that we have contracted to do so ; 
that we have received the consideration for this 
contract from the States of Ohio, Indiana, and Illi- 
nois. If I can establish these as facts, it will follow 
that to stop the road short of the Mississipi^i would 
be a gross neglect of duty, and a flagrant breach of 
national faith. 

In the year 1787, "the territory north-west of the 
Ohio," comprehended what are now the States of 
Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin ter- 
ritory. The celebrated ordinance of 1787, among 
other things, provided that there should be three 
States at least out of this territory, which should be 
bounded by the Ohio riA^er on the South, the Missis- 
sippi on the West, and a specified line on the north. 
This last line, many gentlemen here will recollect, 
was finally established as the northern boundary of 
Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, very lately, on the admis- 
sion of Michigan into the Union. 

Early in the year 1802, the eastern division of 
this territory petitioned Congress to provide for its 



230 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

admission into the Union, under the ordinance of 
1787, which provided that certain portions of the 
territory, having 60,000 inhabitants, shoukl be en- 
titled to come into the Union as sovereign States. 
This application, with a census showing the number 
of inhabitants then within what are the present 
limits of Ohio, was referred to a committee in the 
House of Representatives, of which William B. Giles 
of Virginia, was the chairman. 

On the 4th of March, 1802, Mr. Giles made a 
favorable report on this petition, and, among other 
things, referring to certain matters of compact, in 
the ordinance of 1787, the report concludes in these 
words : 

"The committee, taking into consideration these 
stipulations, viewing the lands of the United States 
within the said territor}^ as an important source of 
revenue ; deeming it also of the highest imjDortance 
to the stability and permanence of the union of the 
Eastern and Western parts of the United States, 
that the intercourse should, as far as j^ossible, be 
facilitated, and their interests be liberally and 
mutually consulted and promoted — are of opinion 
that the provisions of the aforesaid articles may be 
varied for the reciprocal advantage of the United 

States and the State of , when formed, and the 

people thereof; they have therefore deemed it proper, 
in lieu of said provisions, to offer the following prop- 
ositions to the convention of the Eastern State of said 
Territory, when formed, for their free acceptance or 
rejection, without any condition or restraint whatever, 



ON THE CUMBEKLAND ROAD. 231 

wJiich, if accepted hy the convention, shall he obligatory 
an the United States y 

The report then sets forth three propositions to be 
submitted to the Ohio Convention ; the third proposi- 
tion, being the one applicable to this subject, is in 
these words : 

"That one-tenth part of the net proceeds of the 
lands lying in the said States, hereafter sold by Con- 
gress, after deducting all expenses incident to the 
same, shall be applied to the laying out and making 
turnpike or other roads leading from the navigable 
waters emptying into the Atlantic to the Ohio, and 

continued afterward through the State of , such 

roads to be laid out under the authority of Congress, 
with the consent of the several States through which 
the road shall pass, j^rovided that the convention of said 
State shall on its part assent that every and each tract of 
land sold by Congress shall be and remain exempt from 
any tax laid by order or under authority of the States, 
whether for State, county, or toivnship, or any other imr- 
pose whatever, for the term of ten years from and after 
the completion of the payment of the purchase money on 
such tract to the United States.'''' 

Attached to this report is an official letter 
addressed by Mr. Grallatin, then Secretary of the 
Treasury, to Mr. Giles, dated Washington, 13tli Feb- 
ruary, 1802. Mr. Grallatin, deeply impressed with 
the advantage to the Government of this contract 
with the new State, urges it upon Congress as a 
means of increasing the value of the public lands 
owned by the Government, and then pledged for the 



232 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

payment of the national debt. After stating a 
variety of arguments to that effect, he says: 

"It follows that, if it be in a high degree, as I 
believe it is, the interest of the United States to obtain 
some further security against an injurious sale, under 
the Territorial or State laws, of lands sold by them 
to individuals, justice, not less than policy, requires 
that it should be obtained by common consent, and 
it is not to be expected that the new State Legisla- 
tures should assent to any alterations in their system 
of taxation which may affect the revenues of the 
State, unless an equivalent is offered." 

He then goes on to insist that 

'■'"Such conditions, instead of diminishing, would greatly 
increase the value of the lands, and, therefore, of the 
pledge to the ^public cr editor s^ 

The last paragraph in this document urges another 
argument in favor of this road, which I hope will not 
be overlooked by gentlemen who consider it a boon 
merely to the young States of the West. Mr. 
Gallatin thought this road would be highly advan- 
tageous to the old States, and he addresses their 
cupidity accordingly, in these words : 

"The roads will be as beneficial to the parts of the 
Atlantic States through which they are to pass, and 
nearly as muck so to a considerable portion of the Union, 
as the North-western Territory itself." 

On the 30th of April, 1802, an act was passed 
authorizing the people of the eastern division of the 
North-western Territory to form a Constitution and 
State Grovernment. In that law the proposition, 



ON THE CUMBERLAND EOAD. 233 

somewhat modified, is inserted and by Congress pro- 
posed to the Convention which was to assemble the 
next summer. In the act just quoted, Jim per cent, 
of the proceeds of the lands within the State are pro- 
posed as a fund to make a road "from the Atlantic 
waters to and through the State, and the condition of 
the grant is, that the State shall abstain from taxing 
the lands sold by the United States for five years 
from and after the day of their sale." 

In the month of November, 1802, the Convention 
of Ohio assented to the proposition contained in the 
act of April, 1802, with this modification : that three- 
fifths of the five j)er cent, fund should be appropri- 
ated to laying out and making roads within the 
State, and under its direction and authority, leaving 
two per cent, on all the sales of land within the State 
to be appropriated to a road leading from the At- 
lantic waters to and through the State of Ohio. To this 
Congress expressly assented at its next session, ujion 
the recommendation of a committee, of which John 
Randolph of Virginia was the chairman, and thus 
the compact was closed. Here let it be observed 
that compacts, of the same kind and in the same 
words, have been concluded between the States of 
Indiana and Illinois, and this Government, at the 
times when these States were respectively admitted 
into the Union. In this way, following up the pro- 
ject begun in 1802, of constructing a road "from the 
Atlantic waters to the Mississippi river," passing 
from the Ohio the whole distance to the Mississippi, 
through your own public lands, it was carried out by 



234 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

compact with each State, as soon as it became capa- 
ble of entering into such engagements, by assuming 
the powers and dignity of a sovereign State of the 
Union. 

I have said, Mr. Speaker, that you had contracted 
to construct a road from the Athmtic waters, through 
the new States of the West, to the Mississippi river. 
I have shown, by reference to public documents, that 
the motives to this contract were, first, to increase 
the value of the public domain, to and ilirongli which 
this road was to pass, and thus put money into the 
national purse, to pay the national debt ; secondly, to 
bind together in union of interest the East and West, 
by creating a quick and constant intercourse between 
the Western and Atlantic divisions of your common 
country. Now the first main object, the increase in 
value of the public lands, never could be effected, 
unless you carried the road, not merely " to and 
througV Ohio, where, in 1802, your public lands for 
sale chiefly lay, but would only be fairly realized by 
carrying the road "to and tlirougV^ each of the other 
Western States, as your lands, by the extinguish- 
ment of the Indian title in these States, should 
come into market. These were the views upon 
which you set out, in your propositions of com- 
pact, at first. These were your '''■inducements^'' held 
out to Ohio, and repeated in each of your engage- 
ments to make the Cumberland road with Indiana 
and Illinois. With these determinations, asserted 
through your public and autliorizcd agents, you 
ask of the Western States, in consideration of in- 



ox THE CUMBERLAND EOAD. 235 

ducements thus held out, to do what ? To grant you 
a trifling sum of money to aid you in your etfort to 
improve the vaUie of your own hinds ? JN'o. To allow 
you to pass through their territory in such way as 
you choose? No. IN'o such inconsiderable demands 
as these were on your lips. You demanded of them 
to surrender up for your benefit the tax on nearly all 
the property in these States for five years. In other 
words, you asked, and you received too, into the pub- 
lic treasury of the Union, a direct tax for five years 
on all, or nearly all, the lands in three large and 
populous States. You said to the purchaser of your 
lands, buy of us, and your property thus acquired 
shall be free from taxation for five years ; and thus 
you got an increase of price paid to you, what other- 
wise would have gone, in the shape of taxes, into the 
coffers of the States. This is true in regard to almost 
all the lands in the three States of Ohio, Indiana^ 
and Illinois. Each of these States was admitted into 
the Union with barely sixty thousand inhabitants. 
The quantity of lands then sold was so inconsiderable 
as to make no sort of change in the estimated value 
of the right we surrendered. Take Ohio, for exam- 
ple : she gave up to you her right to tax all lands 
then unsold for five years after they should be sold. 
She had then sixty thousand inhabitants, she has 
now probably one million and a half of population, 
and there are yet public lands unsold in that State. 
Thus 3^ou can see that we have released to you our 
right to tax lands in the hands of nine-twentieths of 
our people for five successive years. This, too, was 



236 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

done at a time when there Avas scarcely any other 
subject of taxation but hinds, and when, in the 
intancy of our several State governments, the first 
movements of political and social machinery require 
heavy expense from those least able to bear it. Let 
us see what it was in money that we gave. It will 
be found, on examination, that the three States inter- 
ested cover an area, according to the best authorities, 
of something over one hundred and twenty millions 
of acres of land. Deducting something for reserva- 
tions made before the compact, we may safely esti- 
mate the lands then to be sold in the three Western 
States at one hundred and twenty millions of acres. 
We gave up the right to tax these for five years from 
the day of sale. What has been the usual rate of 
taxation upon lands in these States? I think I may 
fairly afiirm that the rate of taxation on lands in the 
three States interested has been one dollar on every 
hundred acres. This, levied on one hundred and 
twenty millions of acres, would give one million two 
hundred thousand dollars per annum, which, in five 
years, the time for which the tax was surrendered by 
the States, would give the sum of six millions of 
])0LLARS. This sum have we paid into your Trea- 
sury for your promise to complete the road in 
question. In addition to this, we surrendered our 
sovereign right of taxation within our own limits — a 
right itself so dear to States that, as matter of j^ride, 
just pride, its surrender could only have been ex- 
torted by the strongest hope of advantage — the hope 
of some great and striking improvement in our whole 



ox THE CUMBERLAND EOAD. 337 

country, such as this great work will be when you 
complete it, as you have promised. 

Mr. Speaker, I have shown that the three Western 
States have given into the National Treasury, in 
effect six millions of dollars^ for the promise to con- 
struct this road. Let us now advert for a moment 
to the cost of the work as estimated at the time of 
the contract, and we shall find that the Government 
then understood that this sum would construct the 
road from the Atlantic waters to the Mississippi ; 
nay, that in all probability there would be a surplus 
remaining in the Treasury after the road was fin- 
ished. The kind of road, its location, and the time 
of its completion, were all left with this Government 
to be adjusted, under a fair interpretation of the com- 
pact. After proper examination, it was determined 
to commence at Cumberland, and strike the Ohio line 
at Wheeling, in Virginia. 

On the 3d of March, 1808, Mr. Gallatin, then Sec- 
retary of the Treasury, reports to Congress that the 
road had been located from Cumberland toAvard 
Wheeling, a distance of seventy miles, and adds, the 
expense of completing that part of the road is esti- 
mated at $400,000. This estimate shows that the 
average estimated cost of the road, over by far the 
most expensive part of it, was a trifle less than six 
thousand dollars per mile. The whole length of the 
road, from Cumberland to the Mississippi, as sur- 
veyed, is six hundred and fifty miles ; it may be a 
mile or two more or less. Now, take the estimated 
cost per mile, as reported by Mr. Gallatin, which was 



238 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIT^. 

for the mountain region entirely, and remember that 
one half less, it was supposed, would suffice to make 
the road across the level plains of the West, and we 
shall see at once how reasonable it is that the Con- 
gress of that day, after receiving what was equivalent 
to six millions of dollars, should make an uncondi- 
tional promise to construct the road to the Missis- 
sippi river. 

The contract^ as then understood from the estimate, 
was simply as follows : 

Value of the tax released in favor of the Federal Gov- 
ernment by the three Western States, $6,000,000 

Cost of the road 650 miles, at $6,000 per mile, accord- 
ing to Mr. Gallatin's estimate for the first 70 miles, 3,900,000 



$2,100,000 



Leaving two millions in the Treasury, after making 
the road as then estimated. Upon this view, founded 
on facts and representations of public men, cotempo- 
raneous with this compact, it is clearly shown that 
the States paid the Federal Government what the 
parties then believed a full consideration for com- 
pleting the road the entire distance proposed. From 
this, what follows? Why, surely, that the Grovern- 
ment promised to do what in conscience it ought, 
that is, to do the act which they were j)aid for 
doing — ^to make the road complete according to the 
contract. 

But here, Mr. Speaker, I am told that whatever 
may have been the reasonable exj^ectations of the 
parties, as to the completion of this work, when the 



ON THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 239 

contract was made, the Government only bound itself 
to appropriate two per cent, of the nett proceeds of the 
public lands, and that this has been done, and no 
moneys remain of this fund applicable to the pur- 
poses of the contract. To this I reply, that such is 
not the contract, and I think I have shown this from 
the proofs already adduced. I grant you that two 
per cent, of the nett proceeds of the public lands are 
pledged for the performance of your promise to make 
the road ; but this pledge does in no sense limit the 
contract for which it is only a mere security. Let it 
be remembered that, when this contract was made, 
the public lands were pledged for the payment of a 
large national debt. To increase the value of these 
lands was one motive to make the road, and the 
States aided you in this, paid you for it, by relin- 
quishing the taxes on them for five years after sale ; 
it was, therefore, only fair, as the Government was 
deeply in debt, that the States should have some 
security for the performance of your contract. This 
security was given by pledging the two per cent, 
named in the contract. But it was not the contract, 
it was only a security given to the States for its faith- 
ful performance. This interpretation is fortified by 
other stipulations in the contract. The time, man- 
ner, and location of the road, are all left to the Gen- 
eral Government. Why was this ? Because you had 
bound yourselves, in general terms, to make a road. 
And it was, therefore, only reasonable that you 
should have control over a work which you bound 
yourselves to finish. Had you bound yourselves 



240 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWI?^. 

only to ])Sij, for the purposes of the work, a specified 
sum, such as the two per cent, mentioned, is it possi- 
])le to suppose the States would have left you to 
appropriate their money, for which they paid you, in 
}/our oivn way, and according to your own discretion? 
Such a contract, on the part of the States, would 
have been absolute insanity. It involves an absur- 
dity too gross for serious consideration. This itself 
shows that the two per cent, fund was only a jjledge, 
a security, and not, as some have supposed, the con- 
tract itself. Thus you have always construed the 
contract. According to your own admission, you 
have gone on to make the road without regard to the 
two per cent. fund. You say vastly more than this 
has been expended. Why did you do this, if only 
two per cent, on the sales of lands were to be given 
to the road? JNTo rational answer can be given to this 
question, but one. The two per cent, did not limit 
the contract, it only secured its performance ; and this 
has been your oivn uniform construction of it, as 
evinced by all your conduct up to this day, through- 
out a lapse of more than thirty years. 

Let me suppose, Mr. Speaker, that the two per 
cent, fund was all you promised, which, however, I 
by no means admit. You say it was to be expended 
by you ; you are the trustee of the fund, and the 
agent for its appropriation. Be it so, then, for the 
sake of the argument. What was this fund com- 
mitted to 3'our charge? Two per cent, uj^on the 
sales of one hundred and twenty millions of acres of 
land. This you was bound to sell for $2 per acre, 



ox THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 241 

for this was the price fixed by law at the time of the 
contract. This would produce $240,000,000. Two 
per cent, upon this would be $4,800,000. You had 
estimated the road to cost $3,900,000. Thus you see 
that, by every calculation based upon the state of 
things as existing at the date of the contract, the 
States and yourselves had a right to suppose that, 
happen what might, if you acted up to your engage- 
ments, the road would be made. But $2 per acre 
was then the minimum price of the land, and we, 
being interested in the fund, had, and now have 
a right to demand of you that you, as trustee, shall 
get as much more as possible, by selling all the land 
at auction in the way fixed by law as it then stood. 
JN^ow let us see how you have complied with the law 
and reason of this contract in the management of this 
fund given in trust for its execution. In the first 
place you sank the value of the fund nearly one-half 
by reducing the price of the land from $2 to $1.25 
per acre. In the second place, you have given away 
immense amounts of this fund in bounty lands to 
soldiers, which you never can sell, and for which you 
can render no account. Thirdly, you have given to 
individuals, for purposes unconnected with this con- 
tract, a very large amount which never has or can be 
accounted for upon the princijoles of your solemn 
engagements with us. Fourthly, you have given 
very large amounts to the States to make canals, 
exacting from them as an equivalent the right to 
carry your mails, arms, armies, and munitions of war 
on them free of tolls forever. Fifthly, you have 
16 



242 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

given awa}^ many millions of acres in pre-emption 
claims, at the minimum price, without any attempt 
to sell, and account (as you were bound to do) for the 
proceeds. Thus you, our agent to manage a fund 
destined to make mir road, have so wasted it, and 
used it for your own purposes, that you never can 
tell whether it would have produced the expected 
amount or not. What is the consequence in law, in 
reason, in justice? What follows? Why, sir, any 
justice of the peace can tell you. You, the agent, 
must answer for this by replacing, out of your own 
funds, what you have wrongfully taken from us. 
But as you have so disposed of the trust fund that 
you never can tell what, if sold at auction, it would 
have produced, and so can not, by any certain rule, 
therefore, ascertain the amount you have taken 
wrongfully from us, you must suffer the incon- 
venience ; you must take from your own funds, and 
do what, when you contracted with us, you affirmed 
this wasted fund would do, that is, complete the road 
in question from Cumberland to the banks of the 
Mississippi river. 

Is not this equitable, fair, honorable, just? Why 
then stick in the bark? as the lawyers say. Why 
these j^ettifogging quibbles, these dilatory pleas? 
Does such conduct become a great nation? Sir, it 
has been said that honor is the vital princij^le of 
monarchy. You say you represent sovereigns — the 
sovereign people. Act then as becomes the dignity 
of your royal constituents. Leave no room to doubt 
your probity. Observe fully and entirely the faith 



ON THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 243 

of your promise whenever made. 'No such thing, 
shjs the gentleman from South Carolina, [Mr. Clow- 
ney,] this morning. If you have made a contract, 
no matter, you had no constitutional power to do so, 
therefore cease your efforts to fulfill your engage- 
ments. And there the gentleman would stop ; he 
goes no further. What a beautiful example of polit- 
ical morality would you then exhibit! Some years 
ago you entered into a contract, a treaty, wdtli three 
sovereign States. You have received from them all 
they agreed to give you. You have their money in 
your pockets. Now you turn to these States, with all 
seeming honesty, and say, true, I promised, but I had 
no right to promise, my conscience is affected, I have 
sinned, I repent, I will do so no more, but I will keep 
your money. I can not violate iiiy conscience by 
doing as I agreed. Oh, no, that is too wicked; I 
pray you do not ask it; but still I shall keep the 
money you paid me. Yesterday my friend from 
Kentucky, [Mr. Calhoun,] with a power of argument 
and generosity of sentiment equally honorable to his 
head and heart, spoke in favor of this bill; he 
adverted to certain objections made by his colleagues 
[Messrs. Graves and Underwood]. They had opposed 
the bill as partial in its operation, as giving to the 
three States through which the road passes a dis- 
bursement of money which Kentucky was not j^er- 
mitted to enjoy. He said the disbursements in 
Indiana would flow into Louisville, in Kentucky, 
where goods and even liquors would be bought, with 
which the labor on the road would be paid. Upon 



244 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

this another gentleman from South Carolina [Mr, 
Pickens] takes fire. "This," said he, "shows the 
demoralizing tendency of the system! This is the 
motive to vote appropriations, that money be raised 
to buy whisky for the poor laborer to drink?" Sir, 
I have no objection to the gentleman's moral lectures, 
but I do not see the necessity of throwing his moral 
sensibilities into convulsions at the sight of a glass 
of punch, while he can look with a sanctimonious 
composure at broken promises and violated national 
faith. 

Mr. Speaker, I have one word to say, before I sit 
down, to the gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. Under- 
wood]. He spoke the other day in opposition to this 
bill. He did not deny that the Cumberland road 
might be useful ; but, as he could obtain no money 
here to enable his people to build dams and make 
slack-water navigation on Green river, he would not 
help us to make a road on the northern side of the 
Ohio. And then the gentleman proceeded in a grave 
disquisition upon our constitutional powers to make 
roads and improve rivers. What says the Constitu- 
tion? "Congress shall have power to regulate com- 
merce with foreign nations, among the several States^ 
and with the Indian tribes? What is the gentleman's 
commentary? You have, says he, a clear and un- 
doubted right to improve rivers, but not so of roads. 
And why, Mr. Speaker, why ? Do you, sir, remem- 
ber the reason for this distinction? It was this: 
"Providence," says the gentleman, "has marked out 
rivers as the proper channels and avenues of com- 



ON THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 245 

merce." What a beautiful and exalted piety is here 
shedding its clear light upon the dark mysteries of 
constitutional law! And then how logical the con- 
clusion! Thus runs the argument: Since it is not 
the will of God that commerce should be carried on 
on dry land, but only on the water, the powers over 
commerce, given in the Constitution by our pious 
ancestors, must be understood as limited by the 
Divine commands ; and therefore, says he, you have 
jjower to remove sand-bars and islands, and blow uj) 
rocks out of rivers and creeks, to make a channel 
which Providence has begun and left unfinished ; but 
beware, he would say, "how you cut down a tree, or 
remove a rock, on the dry land, to complete what 
Providence has begun there. You have no power 
by law to do this last; beside, it is impious, it is not 
the will of God." 

Mr. Speaker, I know of no parallel to this charm- 
ing philosophy, unless it is to be found in the sayings 
of Mause Hedrigg, an elderly Scotch lady, who 
figures in one of Sir Walter Scott's novels. In one 
of her evangelical moods, she rebuked her son Cuddie 
for using a fan, or any work of art, to clean his 
barley. She said it was an awsome denial o' Provi- 
dence not to wait his own time, when he would surely 
send wind to winnow the chaff out of the grain. In 
the same spirit of enlightened philosophy does the 
gentleman exhort us in Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, 
to cease our impious road-making, and wait the good 
time of Providence, who will, as he seems to think, 
surely send a river to run from Cumberland over the 



246 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

Alleghanies, across the Ohio, and so on, in its heaven- 
directed course, to St. Louis. Mr. Speaker, the gen- 
tleman from Kentucky is not the author of this 
theory. Our Atlantic brethren, especially of the 
South, have Ions: held the same doctrine, Thev have 
long since discovered that our glorious Constitution 
was nothing more at last than a fish ! made for the 
water, and which can only live in the water. Accord- 
ing to their views, he is a goodly fish, of marvelous 
proper uses and functions while you keep him in the 
water; but the moment he touches dry land, lo! he 
suffocates and dies. The only difference between this 
school of constitutional lawyers and the gentleman 
from Kentucky is this : he believes your Constitution 
is a fish that thrives in all waters, and especially in 
Green river slack-water ; whereas, his brethren of the 
South insist that he can only live in salt water. 
With them the doctrine is, wherever the tide ceases 
to flow, he dies. He can live and thrive in a little 
tide creek, which a thirsty musquito would drink dry 
in a hot day; but j)lace him on or under the majtr^tic 
wave of the Mississippi, and in an instant he expires. 
Mr. Speaker, who can limit the range of science! 
What hand can stay the march of mind! Hereto- 
fore we have studied the science of law to help us in 
our understanding of the Constitution. Some have 
brought metaphysical learning to this aid. But 
now, in the middle of the nineteenth century, these 
labors are all ended. Ichthyology, sir, is the key to 
open all the doors that have hitherto barred our 
approaches to truth. According to this new :\'hool 



ON THE CUMBERLAND ROAD. 247 

of philosophy, if you just teach coming generations 
the "nature of fish," those great problems in consti- 
tutional law that vexed and worried the giant intel- 
lects of Hamilton, Madison, and Marshall, are at 
once revealed and made plain to the dullest peasant 
in the land. Sir, if I aj^pear to trifle with this grave 
subject, the fault is not mine; it arises from the sin- 
gular nature and contrarient character of those 
arguments which I am most unwillingly compelled 
to combat. 

The gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. Underwood] 
has inquired, with a very significant look, what has 
become of the three per cent, fund, given to the 
States for improvements within their respected limits. 
He says he has inquired of the Secretary of the 
Treasury, and he can give him no account of the 
disposition the Western States may have made of 
this fund, and hence the gentleman seemed to infer 
that no one could tell him anything satisfactory on 
the subject. Sir, if your Secretary of the Treasury 
is the only source of information, then are the foun- 
tains of knowledge scanty indeed, and nearly dried 
up with us. If everything is unknown which he 
does not hioio, if we can see nothing which has not 
been revealed to him, why, then, the Lord help us; 
the lights of the age burn dimly enough, and must 
be well-nigh extinct. Sir, if the gentleman, instead 
of consulting the "Penny Magazine" of the Treasury, 
had gone to the libraries of this city, and looked into 
the statistics of these States, he would have found 
that this fund had been faithfully, to the last dollar. 



248 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

expended in making roads "to and through" the 
public lands in the States; thus increasing the value 
and hastening the sale of your national property. 
The gentleman reproaches the three States on the 
right bank of the Ohio for having obtained from the 
national domain large grants for making roads and 
canals. Does not the gentleman know that in every 
instance you have received an equivalent for these 
lands, by obtaining from the States or companies the 
right to carry your mails, arms, troops, and muni- 
tions of war, over such roads or canals, at all times 
free of charge? If you gave the alternate sections 
of land for a road or canal, you held up the remain- 
ing section at double your minimum price, and have 
always realized it, and thus made money for your- 
selves out of the capital and labor of the States, 
while you boast the transaction as a benevolence to 
others. 

But, sir, Kentucky, should be the last State in the 
Union to raise an argument of this kind against her 
sisters of the West. How came she by the whole of 
that very Green river country w^hich now comprises 
one-fourth of that State? Virginia had reserved that 
territory to satisfy her Revolutionary debt to her 
troops. When she ceded the north-western territory 
to the United States, she reserved the land between 
the Little Miami and Scioto rivers (now in Ohio) as 
a residuary fund for the satisfaction of her Revolu- 
tionary land warrants ; if the lands reserved for that 
purpose in Kentucky should prove insufficient. Well, 
sir, what happened? Soon after this, Kentucky seized 



ON THE CUMBEELANP EOAD. 249 

upon the whole Grreeii river counky, and refused to 
the war-worn veteran of the Revohition the right to 
locate his warrants there. The consequence was, the 
whole country reserved in Ohio was exhausted, and 
the Virginia claims, to the amount of many millions, 
have been lately paid of the treasury of the Union in 
the shape of land scrip. Sir, I have said this domain, 
thus seized by Kentucky, was equcil to one-fourth 
part of the State. JNTow, suppose you had given to 
Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, wdiat Kentucky received — 
one-fourth part of all the lands within their respect- 
ive limits — sir, it would have constructed this road 
tlirough their territories ten times over. And yet, 
with these facts all before him, the gentleman sits 
weeping over the dams and slackwater of Green 
river like a froward child, spoiled by too much indul- 
gence, complaining of its mother's partiality, to the 
really much less favored members of our common 
family. Sir, this is unlike Kentucky; it is unlike 
the uniform justice and generosity of both the gentle- 
men, [Messrs. Graves and Underwood,] who have so 
vehemently opposed this bill. I beseech them to 
desist. Cease to drive this Jew's bargain with your 
sister States. Relax the miser's gripe you have laid 
upon your neighbor's rights. Throw away the knife 
of Shylock, clothe yourselves in the robes of justice 
and generosity. Stand out in your true characters, 
and in the proper costume of your noble State. Look 
upon this bill with the eye of the American states- 
man. The interests of the whole valley we inhabit 
in common are the same. You can not separate 



250 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

them by lines or rivers. Sir, the same cloud that 
dispenses its fertilizing showers upon Kentucky, 
drops fatness upon the States of Ohio, Indiana, and 
Illinois. The same sun that warms vegetation into 
early and vigorous life, on the rich plantations of Ken- 
tucky, also mellows the fruit and ripens the harvests 
that cover the vast plains outstretched upon the right 
bank of the Ohio. The God of Xature has decreed 
us a common lot, and it is vain and impious to inter- 
pose our feeble opposition to his will. 

Mr. Speaker, some gentlemen have complained 
that one section of land out of every thirty-six has 
been given to the Western States for the use of com- 
mon schools. Do gentlemen recollect to whom this 
benefit results ? Who are they that inhabit the great 
valleys of the West? Emigrants sm-ely fi'om the old 
States of the South and East. The children to be 
educated there are your children. Sir, we heard 
(some at least) an English gentleman [Mr. Bucking- 
ham] in one of his interesting lectures lately deliv- 
ered in this city, say, when sj^eaking of British emi- 
gration to America, that he was sorry they had not 
sent to this country better specimens of their popula- 
tion. Sir, I can say to my fi'iends on this side of the 
mountains, with equal sincerity, as to some of those 
you sent out, '' I am sorry you did not send us better 
specimens." But the truth is, we get in the West 
the very best and the very worst of your population. 
The poor come there for bread, and the enterprising 
and industrious come to find a field which gives 
ample scope to their energies and rewards to their 



ON THE CUMBEELAND EOAD. 251 

labor. This fund, then, is for the education of the 
poor, and the rich, too, if any such there be, which 
you send in masses every year to the West. And I 
can assure gentlemen it has been faithfully applied 
in Ohio. It has been added to by heavy taxation 
upon our people. Some gentlemen (I speak it in no 
spirit of pride or vain boasting), some gentlemen 
from the old States might learn something new to 
them in the history of civilization, would they but 
visit that Western world, of which they often seem 
to me to know very little. They might see there, in 
the very spot where but yesterday the wild beasts of 
the wilderness seized their prey by night, and made 
their covert lair by day, on that same spot to-day 
stands the common schoolhouse, filled alike with the 
children of the rich and the poor — those children 
who are to be the future voters, officers, and states- 
men of the Republic. Over that vast region, so 
lately red with the blood of savage war, the seed- 
fields of knowledge are planted, and a smiling harvest 
of civilization springs up. And there, too, may be 
seen what a Christian statesman might well admire. 
The schoolmaster is not alone. That holy religion, 
which is at last the only sure basis of permanent 
social or j)olitical improvement, has there its voices 
crying in the wilderness. Upon the almost burning 
embers of the war-fire, round which some barbarous 
chief but yesterday recounted to his listening tribe, 
with horrid exultation, his deeds of savage heroism, 
to-day is built a temple dedicated to that religion 
which announces "peace on earth and good-will 



252 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

toward men." Yes, sir, all over that land, side by 
side with the humble schoolhouse, stand those 

" Steeple-towers, 
And spires whose silent finger points to Heaven." 

Is it, sir, can it be in the heart of an American 
statesman, to check in its progress, or crush in its 
infancy, a social and political system which has ten- 
dencies and fruits like this ? But, sir, I find myself 
tempted, by themes so full of hope, to wander, as 
some may think, into subjects having a bearing ujDon 
the immediate question, too remote to justify their 
discussion here. I beg to remind this House that 
the bill now before it is a part, small, indeed, but 
still a part of a system of policy which long ago you 
established for the Western country, which hitherto 
you have cherished, and which, aided by the patient, 
persevering labor of your people there, has produced 
the happy results which I have so hastily and imj)er- 
fectly laid before you. I feel an assured confidence 
that I do not plead in ^ain to an American Congress 
in such a cause. Still should I unhappily be mis- 
taken in this, conscious of the rectitude of my own 
motives, I shall cheerfully submit to whatever deci- 
sion it shall please the House to make. 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 

[On the 14th of Feb., 1840, the Hon. Isaac E. Crary, of Mich- 
igan, having in the course of his remarks in Committee of the 
Whole — on referring the memorial of the National Road Conven- 
tion, held at Terre Haute, Indiana, to the Committee of Ways and 
Means, animadverted upon the Military conduct of Gen. Harrison, 
Mr. CoRWiN, on the next day, addressed the House as follows :] 

Mr. Speaker: 

I am admonished, by the eager solicitations of 
gentlemen around me to give way for a motion to 
adjourn, of that practice of the House which accords 
us more of leisure on this day than is allowed us on 
any other day of the week. The servants of other 
good masters are, I believe, indulged in a sort of 
saturnalium in the afternoon on Saturday; and we 
have supposed that our kind masters, the peoj^le, 
might be willing to grant us, their most faithful 
slaves, a similar respite from toil. It is now past 
three o'clock in the afternoon, and I should be very 
willing to pause in discussion, were I not urged by 
those menacing cries of "Go on," from various ^^arts 
of the House. In this state of things, I can not hope 
to summon to anything like attention the unquiet 
minds of many, or the jaded and worn-down faculties 
of a still larger portion of the House. I hope, how- 
ever, the House will not withhold from me a boon 
which I have often seen granted to others, that is, 
the privilege of speaking without being oppressed by 



^ 



254 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

a crowded audience, wliicli is accompanied by this 
additional advantage, that the orator, thus situated, 
can at least listen to and hear himself. 

If you, Mr. Speaker, and the members of this 
House, have given that attention to the speech of 
the gentleman from Michigan, [Mr. Crary,] made 
yesterday, which some of us here thought it our 
duty to bestow, I am sure the novelty of the scene, 
to say nothing more of it, must have arrested your 
curiosity, if, indeed, it did not give rise to profound 
reflection. 

I need not remind the House that it is a rule here 
(as I suppose it is everywhere else where men dis- 
pute by any rule at all ) that what is said in debate 
should be relevant and pertinent to the subject under 
discussion. The question before us is a j^rox^osition 
to instruct the committee of Ways and Means to 
report a bill granting four hundred and fifty thousand 
dollars to continue the construction of the Cumber- 
land road in the States of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. 
The objections to the measure are, either that this 
Government is in no sense bound by compact to make 
the road, or that it is not a work of any national 
concern, but merely of local interest, or that the 
present exhausted state of the Treasury will not 
warrant the appropriation, admitting the object of it 
to be fairly within the constitutional province of 
Congress. 

If the gentleman from South Carolina, [Mr. Pick- 
ens,] and the gentleman from Maine, [Mr. Parris,] 
who consider the Cumberland road a work of mere 



KEPLY TO GENEEixL CRARY. 255 

seetional advantage to. a very small portion of the 
people, have attended to the sage disquisitions of the 
gentleman from Michigan on the art of war, they 
must now either come to the conclusion that almost 
the whole of the gentleman's speech is what old- 
fashioned people would call a ^'•non sequitur,^^ or else 
that this road connects itself with not merely the 
military defenses of the Union, but is interwoven 
most intimately with the progress of science, and 
especially that most difficult of all sciences, the 
proper application of strategy to the exigencies of 
barbarian warfare. It will be seen that the far-see- 
ing sagacity and long-reaching understanding of the 
gentleman from Michigan has discovered that, before 
we can vote with a clear conscience on the instruc- 
tions proposed, we must be well informed as to the 
number of Indians who fought at the battle of Tip- 
pecanoe in 1811; how these savages were painted, 
whether red, black, or blue, or whether all were 
blended on their barbarian faces. Further, according 
to his views of the subject, before we vote money to 
make a road, we must know and approve of what 
General Harrison thought, said, and did, at the battle 
of Tippecanoe. 

Again, upon this process of reasoning, we must 
inquire where a general should be when a battle 
begins, especially in the night, and what his position 
during the fight, and where he should be found when 
it is over ; and particularly how a Kentuckian behaves 
himself when he hears an Indian warwhoop in day 
or night. And, after settling all these puzzling 



256 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

propositions, still we must fully understand how and 
by whom the battle of the Thames was fought, and 
in what manner it then and there became our troops, 
regular and militia, to conduct themselves. Sir, it 
must be obvious that if these topics are germain to 
the subject, then does the Cumberland road encom- 
pass all the interests and all the subjects that touch 
the rights, duties, and destinies of the civilized world ; 
and I hope we shall hear no more from Southern 
gentlemen of the narrow, sectional, or unconstitutional 
character of the proposed measure. That branch 
of the subject is, I hoj^e, forever quieted, perhaps 
unintentional, Y, by the gentleman from Michigan. 
His military criticism, if it has not answered the 
purj^oses intended, has at least, in this way, done 
some service to the Cumberland road. And if my 
2:)Oor halting comprehension has not blundered, in 
pursuing the soaring upward flight of my friend from 
Michigan, he has in this discussion written a new 
chapter in the ^'regtdm 'philosophandi,'''' and made not 
ourselves only, but the w'hole world his debtors in 
gratitude, by overturning the old worn-out principles 
of the "inductive system." 

Mr. Speaker, there have been many and ponder- 
(uis volumes written, and various unctuous discourses 
delivered, on the doctrines of "association." Dugald 
Stewart, a Scotch gentleman of no mean pretensions 
in his day, thought much and Avrote much concerning 
that principle in mental philosophy; and Brown, 
another of the same school, but of later date, has 
also written and said much on the subject. This 



EEPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 257 

latter gentleman, I think, calls it "suggestion;" but 
never, I venture to say, did any metaphysician, 
pushing his researches furthest and deepest into that 
occult science, dream that would come to pass which 
we have discovered and clearly developed — that is, 
that two subjects so unlike as an appropriation to a 
road in 1840, and the tactics proper in Indian war in 
1811, were not merely akin, but actually, identically, 
the same. 

Mr. Speaker, this discussion, I should think, if not 
absolutely absurd and utterly ridiculous, which my 
respect for the gentleman from Michigan and the 
American Congress will not allow me to suppose, has 
elicted another trait in the American character which 
has been the subject of great admiration with intel- 
ligent travelers from the old world. Foreigners 
have admired the ease with which we Yankees, as 
they call us, can turn our hands to any business or 
pursuit, public or private ; and this has been brought 
forward by our own people as a proof that man, in 
this great and free republic, is a being very far supe- 
rior to the same animal in other parts of the globe 
less favored than ours. A proof of the most con- 
vincing character of this truth, so flattering to our 
national pride, is exhibited before our eyes in the 
gentleman from Michigan delivering to the world a 
grave lecture on the campaigns of General Harrison, 
including a variety of very interesting military 
events in the years 1811, 1812, and 1813. In all 
other countries, and in all former times, before now, 
a gentleman who would either speak or be listened 
17 



258 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

to, on the subject of war, involving subtle criticisms 
on strategy, and careful reviews of marches, sieges, 
battles, regular and casual, and irregular onslaughts, 
would be required to show, first, that he had studied 
much, investigated fully, and digested well, the 
science and history of his subject. But here, sir, no 
such painful preparation is required; witness the 
gentleman from Michigan. lie has announced to 
the House that he is a militia general on the peace 
establishment! That he is a lawyer we know, toler- 
ably well read in Tidd's Practice and Espinasse's 
]^[isi Prius. These studies, so happily adapted to 
the subject of war, ^vith an aj^iiointment in the 
militia in time of peace, furnish him at once with 
all the knowledge necessary to discourse to us, as 
from high authority, upon all the mysteries in the 
"trade of death." Again, Mr. Speaker, it must 
occur to every one that we, to whom these questions 
are submitted and these criticisms are addressed, 
being all colonels at least, and most of us, like the 
gentleman himself, brigadiers, are, of all conceivable 
tribunals, best qualified to decide any nice point 
connected with military science. I hope the House 
will not be alarmed Ijy an impression that I am 
about to discuss one or the other of the military 
([uestions now before us at length, but I wish to 
submit a remark or two, by vray of preparing us for 
a proper appreciation of the merits of the discourse 
we have heard. I trust, as we are all brother 
officers, that the gentleman from Michigan and the 
two hundred and forty colonels or generals of this 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 259 

honorable House, will receive what I have to say, as 
coming from an old brother in arms, and addressed 
to them in a sj^irit of candor, 

"Such as becomes comrades free, 
Reposing after victory." 

Sir, we all know the military studies of the gentle- 
man from Michigan before he was promoted. I take it 
to be beyond a reasonable doubt, that he had perused 
with great care the title-page of "Baron Steuben." 
Xay, I go further; as the gentleman has incidentally 
assured us he is prone to look into musty and 
neglected volumes, I venture to assert, without vouch- 
ing the fact from personal knowledge, that he has 
prosecuted his researches so far, as to be able to 
know that the rear rank stands right behind the 
front. This, I think, is fairly inferable from v»^liat I 
understand him to say of the two lines of encamp- 
ment at Tippecanoe. Thus we see, Mr. Speaker, 
that the gentleman from Michigan, so far as study 
can give us knowledge of a subject, comes before us 
with claims to great profundity. But this is a sub- 
ject which, of all others, requires the aid of actual 
experience to make us wise. Xow the gentleman 
from Michigan, being a militia general, as he has 
told us, his brother officers, in that simple statement 
has revealed the glorious history of toils, privations, 
sacrifices, and bloody scenes, through which we know, 
from experience and observation, a militia officer in 
time of peace is sure to pass. We all, in fancy, 
now see the gentleman fi'om Michigan in that most 



260 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

dangerous and glorious event in the life of a militia 
general on the peace establishment — a parade day! 
The day for which all the other days of his life seem 
to ha^^e been made. We can see the troops in motion ; 
umbrellas, hoe and ax-handles, and other like deadly 
implements of war overshadowing all the field, when 
lo ! the leader of the host approaches, 

" Far off his coming shines ;" 

his plume, white, after the fashion of the great Bour- 
bon, is of ample length, and reads its doleful history 
in the bereaved necks and bosoms of forty neighbor- 
ing hen-roosts ! Like the great Suwaroff, he seems 
somewhat careless in forms and points of dress; hence 
his epaulettes may be on his shoulders back or sides, 
but still gleaming, gloriously gleaming in the sun. 
[Mounted he is, too, let it not be forgotten. Need I 
describe to the colonels and generals of this honor- 
able House the steed which heroes bestride on such 
occasions ? 'No, I see the memory of other days is 
with 3^ou. You see before you the gentleman from 
Michigan mounted on his crop-eared, bushy-tailed 
mare, the singular obliquities of whose hinder limbs 
is described by that most expressive phrase, " sickle 
hams" — ^lier hight just fourteen hands, "all told;" 
yes, sir, there you see his " steed that laughs at the 
shaking of the spear;" that is, his "war-horse whose 
neck is clothed with thunder."' Mr. Speaker, we 
have glowing descriptions in history, of Alexander 
the Great and his war-horse Bucephalus, at the head 
of the invincible Macedonian phalanx, but, sir, such 



EEPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 261 

are the improvements of modern times, that every 
one must see that om' militia general, with his crop- 
eared mare, with bushy tail and sickle ham, would 
literally frighten off a battle-field a hundred Alex- 
anders. But, sir, to the history of the parade-day. 
The general thus mounted and equipped is in the 
field, and ready for action. On the eve of some 
desperate enterprise, such as giving order to shoul- 
der arms, it may be, there occurs a crisis, one of the 
accidents of war which no sagacity could foresee or 
prevent. A cloud rises and passes over the sun! 
Here an occasion occurs for the display of that 
greatest of all traits in the character of a com- 
mander, that tact which enables him to seize upon 
and turn to good account events unlocked for as they 
arise. JSTow for the caution wherewith the Roman 
Fabius foiled the skill and courage of Hannibal. A 
retreat is ordered, and troops and general, in a 
twinkling, are found safely bivouacked in a neighbor- 
ing grocery! But even here the general still has 
room for the exhibition of heroic deeds. Hot fi'om 
the field, and chafed with the untoward events of 
the day, your general unsheaths his trenchant blade, 
eighteen inches in length, as you will well remember, 
and with an energy and remorseless fury he slices 
the watermelons that lie in heaps around him, and 
shares them with his surviving friends. Other of 
the sinews of war are not wanting here. Whisky, 
Mr. Speaker, that great leveler of modern times, is 
here also, and the shells of the watermelons are filled 
to the brim. Here again, Mr. Speaker, is shown 



262 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

how the extremes of barbarism and civilization meet. 
As the Scandinavian heroes of old, after the fatigues 
of war, drank wine from the skulls of* their slaugh^ 
tered enemies, in Odin's Halls, so now our militia 
general and his forces, from the skulls of melons thus 
vanquished, in copious draughts of whisky assuage 
the heroic fire of their souls, after the bloody scenes 
of a parade-day. But, alas, for this short-lived race 
of ours, all things will have an end, and so even is it 
with the glorious achievements of our general. Time 
is on the wing, and will not stay his flight ; the sun, 
as if frightened at the mighty events of the day, 
rides down the sky, and at the close of the day when 
"the hamlet is still," the curtain of night drops upon 
the scene ; 

" And glory, like the phoenix in its fires, 
Exhales its odors, blazes, and expires." 

Such, sir, has been the experience in war of the 
gentleman from Michigan. We know this from the 
simple annunciation that he is and has been a briga- 
dier of militia in time of peace ; and now, having a 
fiil'l understanding of the qualifications of our learned 
general, both from study and practice, I hope the 
House will see that it should give its profound reflec- 
tion to his discourses on the art of war. And this il 
will be more inclined to, when we take into view that 
the gentleman has, in his review of Greneral Harri- 
son's campaigns, modestly imputed to the latter 
great mistakes, gross blunders, imbecility, and even 
worse than this, as I shall show hereafter. The 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 263 

force, too, of the lecture of our learned and experi- 
enced friend from Michigan is certainly greath^ 
enhanced, when we consider another admitted fact, 
which is, that the general whose imbecility and errors 
he has discovered, has not, like the gentleman from 
Michigan, the great advantage of serving in water- 
melon campaigns, but only fought fierce Indians in 
the dark forests of the West, under such stupid 
fellows as Anthony Wayne, and was afterward ap- 
pointed to the command of large armies by the 
advice of such an inexperienced boy as Gov. Shelby, 
the hero of King's Mountain. 

And now^, Mr. Speaker, as I have the temerity to 
entertain doubts, and with great deference to differ 
in my opinions on this military question with the 
gentleman from Michigan, I desire to state a few 
historical facts concerning Greneral Harrison, whom 
the general from Michigan has pronounced incapa^ 
ble, imbecile, and, as I shall notice hereafter, some- 
thing worse even than these. General Harrison w^as 
commissioned by General Washington an officer in 
the regular army of the United States in the year 
1791. Pie served as aid to General Anthony Wayne, 
in the campaign against the Indians, which resulted 
in the battle of the Rapids of the Maumee, in the 
fall of 1794. Thus, in his youth, he was selected by 
General Wayne as one of his military family. And 
what did this youthful officer do in that memorable 
battle of the Rapids? Here, Mr. Speaker, let me 
summon a witness merely to show how military men 
may differ. The witness I call to controvert the 



264 . SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

opinion of the gentleman from Michigan is General 
Anthony Wayne. In his letter to the Secretary of 
War, giving an account of the battle of the Rapids, 
he sa3's : 

"My faithful and gallant Lieutenant Harrison ren- 
dered the most essential services, by communicating 
my orders in every direction, and by his conduct and 
bravery exciting the troops to press for victory." 

Sir, this evidence was given by General Wayne in 
the year 1794, some time, I imagine, before the gen- 
tleman from Michigan was born, and long before he 
became a militia general, and long, very long, before 
he ever perused the title-page of Baron Steuben. 
Mr. Speaker, let me remind the House, in j^assing, 
that this battle and victory over the Indian forces of 
the North-west, in which, according to the testimony 
of General Wayne, " Lieutenant Harrison rendered 
the most essential services by his conduct and bra- 
very," gave peace to an exposed line of frontier, 
extending from Pittsburgh to the southern borders of 
Tennessee. It was, in truth, the close of the war of 
the Revolution, for the Indians who took part with 
Great Britain in our Revolutionary struggle never 
laid down their arms until after they were van- 
quished by Wayne in 1794. 

We now come to see something of the man, 
the general, whose military history our able and 
experienced general from Michigan has reviewed. 
We know that debates like this have sometimes 
been had in the British Parliament. There, I be- 
lieve, the discussion was usually conducted by those 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 265 

in the House, who have seen, and not merely heard, 
of service. We all know that Colonel JSTapier has, 
in several volumes, reviewed the campaigns of Wel- 
lington, and criticised the movements and merits of 
Beresford, and Soult, and Massena, and many others, 
quite, yes, I say quite as well known in military his- 
tory as any of us, not even excepting our general 
from Michigan. We respect the opinions of Napier, 
because we know he not only thought of war, but that 
he fought too. We respect and admire that combi- 
nation of military skill, with j^rofound statesmanlike 
views, which we find in "Csesar's Commentaries," 
because we know the "mighty Julius" was a soldier, 
trained in the field, and inured to the accidents and 
dangers of war. But, sir, we generals of Congress 
require no such painful discipline to give value to our 
opinions. We men of the nineteenth century know 
all things intuitively. We understand perfectly 
the military art by nature. Yes, sir, the notions of 
the gentleman from Michigan, agree exactly wdth a 
sage by the name of "Dogberry," who insisted that 
" reading and writing come by nature." Mr. Speaker 
we have heard and read much of the " advance of 
knowledge, the improvement of the species, and the 
great march of mind," but never till now have we 
understood the extent of meaning in these pregnant 
phrases. For instance, the gentleman from Michi- 
gan asserts that General Harrison has none of the 
qualities of a general because, at the battle of Tippe- 
canoe he was found at one time at a distance from 
his tent, urging his men on to battle. He exposed 



26Q SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

his 23ei'son too much, it seems. He shoukl have staid 
at his tent, and waited for the officers to come to him 
for orders. Well, sir, see now to what conclusion 
this leads us. JN^apoleon seized a standard at Lodi, 
and rushed in fi'ont of his columns across a narrow 
bridge, which was swept by a whole park of German 
artillery. Hence, Napoleon was no officer; he did 
not know how to command an army. He, like Harri- 
son, exposed his person too much. Oh, Mr. Speaker, 
what a pity for poor Najioleon that he had not stu- 
died Steuben, and slaughtered watermelons with us 
natural-born generals of this great age of the world ! 
Sir, it might have altered the map of Europe; nay, 
changed the destinies of the world ! 

Again : Alexander the Great spurred his horse 
foremost into the river, and led his Macedonians 
across the Granicus to rout the Persians who stood 
full opposed on the other side of the stream. True, 
this youth conquered the world, and made himself 
master of what had constituted the Medean, Persian, 
Assyrian, and Chaldean empires. Still, according, 
to the judgment of us warriors by nature, the mighty 
Macedonian would have consulted good sense by 
coming over here, if, indeed, there were any here 
hereabouts in those days, and studying, like my 
friend from Michigan, first Tidd's Practice, and 
Espinasse's Nisi Prius, and a little snatch of Steu- 
ben, and serving as a general of militia awhile. Sir, 
Alexander the Great might have made a man of 
himself in the art of war, had he even been a mem- 
ber of our Congress, and heard us colonels discuss 



EEPLY TO GENEEAL CEAEY. 267 

the subject of an afternoon or two. Indeed, Alex- 
ander, or Satan, I doubt not, would have improA'ed 
greatly in strategy by observing, during this session, 
the tactics of the Administration party on the J^few 
Jersey election question. Mr. Speaker, this objection 
to a general, because he will fight, is not original 
with my friend from Michigan. I remember a great 
authority, in point, agreeing with the gentleman in 
this. In the times of the Henrys, 4th and 5th, of 
England, there lived one Captain Jack Falstaff. If 
Shakspeare may be trusted, his opinions of the art 
military w^ere exactly those of the gentleman from 
Michigan. He uniformly declared as his deliberate 
judgment on the subject, that "discretion was the 
better part of valor;" and this is an authority for 
the gentleman. But wdio shall decide? Thus the 
authority stands — Alexander, the mighty Greek, and 
JSTapoleon Bonaparte, and Harrison, on one side, and 
Captain John Falstaff and the General from Michi- 
gan on the other! Sir, I must leave a question thus 
sustained by authorities, both ways, to posterity. 
Perhaps the lights of another age may enable the 
world to decide it; I confess my inability to say on 
wdiich side the weight of authority lies. 

I hope I may obtain the pardon of the American 
Congress for adverting, in this discussion, to another 
matter, gravely put forward by the gentleman from 
ISIichigan. Without the slightest feeling of disre- 
spect to' that gentleman, I must be allow^ed to say 
that his opinions, (hastily, I am sure,) obtruded on 



268 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the House on this military question, can only be con- 
sidered as subjects of merriment. 

But I come to notice, since I am compelled to it, 
one observation of the gentleman, which I feel quite 
certain, on reflection, he will regret himself. In a 
sort of parenthesis in his speech, he said that a 
rumor prevailed at the time, (alluding to the battle 
of Tippecanoe,) that Colonel Joseph H. Davies of 
Kentucky, who commanded a squadron of cavalry 
there, was, by some trick of General Harrison, 
mounted, during the battle, on a white horse belong- 
ing to the General, and that, being thus conspicuous 
in the fight, he was a mark for the assailing Indians, 
and fell in a charge at the head of his men. The 
gentleman says he does not vouch for the truth of this. 
Sir, it is well that he does not vouch here for the 
truth of a long-exploded slander. It requires a bold 
man, a man possessing a great deal of moral courage, 
to make even an allusion to a charge such as that, 
against one whose only possessions in this world 
are his character for courage and conduct in war in 
his country's defense, and his unstained integrity in 
the various civil offices it has been his duty to occu})y. 
Did not the gentleman know that this vile story was 
known by every intelligent man west of the moun- 
tains to be totally without foundation? The gentle- 
man seemed to appeal to the gallant Kentuckians to 
prove the truth of this inuendo. He spoke of the 
blood of their countrymen so profusely poured out at 
Tippecanoe, as if they would give countenance to 



EEPLY TO GENEKAL CRAEY. 269 

the idea that the gallant Davies, who fell in that en- 
gagement, fell a victim to the artifice of the com- 
manding general, and their other gallant sons who 
fell there, were wantonly sacrificed by the gross 
ignorance of General Harrison in Indian warfare. 
'Now, sir, before the gentleman made his tippeal, he 
should have remembered a few historical facts, 
which, if known to him, as I should suppose they 
were to every other man twenty years of age in 
Western America, would make the whole speech of 
that gentleman little else than a most wanton insult 
to the understanding of the people and Government 
of Kentucky. Let us briefly notice the facts. 

In IVovember, 1811, the battle of Tippecanoe was 
fought. There Colonel Davies and Colonel Owens, 
with other Kentuckians, fell. These, says the gen- 
tleman, (at least he insinuates it,) were sacrificed by 
either the cowardly artifice or by the ignorance of 
General Harrison. JNTow, Mr. Speaker, I abhor the 
habit of open flattery, nay, I do not like to look in 
the face of a man, and speak of him in warm terms 
of eulogium, however he may deserve it ; but, sir, on 
this occasion I am obliged to say what history will 
attest of the people of Kentucky. If any commu- 
nity of j^eople ever lived, from the time of the dis- 
persion on the plain of Shinar up to this day, who 
were literally cradled in war, it is to be found in the 
State of Kentucky. From the first exploration of the 
country by Daniel Boone up to the year 1794, they 
were ene-as'ed in one incessant battle with the sava2:es 



'&"& 



of the West. Trace the path of an Indian incursion 



270 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

anywhere over the great valley of the West, and 
you will find it red w^ith Kentucky blood. Wander 
over any of the battle-fields of that great theater of 
savage war, and you will find it white with the bones 
of her children. In childhood they fought the In- 
dians, with their sisters and mothers, in their dwel- 
lings. In youth and ripe manhood they fought them 
in ambuscades and open battle-fields. Such were 
the men of Kentucky in 1811, when the battle of 
Tippecanoe was fought. There, too, as we know, 
they were still found, foremost where life was to be 
lost, or glory won ; and there the}^ were commanded 
by General Harrison. Now sir, if in that battle 
General Harrison had not conducted as became a 
soldier and a general, would not such men have 
seen and known it? Did Kentucky in 1811, mourn- 
ing as she then did the loss of one of her greatest 
and most valued citizens, condemn (as the gentle- 
man from Michigan has attempted to) the conduct 
of the General who commanded in that battle? Let 
us see how they testified. 

In January, 1812, two months after the battle of 
Tippecanoe, the Legislature of Kentucky w^as in 
session. On the 7th of January, 1812, the following 
resolution passed that body: 

^^Besolved, hy the Senate ami House of Bepresentatives 
of the State of Kentucky, That in the late campaign 
against the Indians upon the Wabash, Governor 
William Henry Harrison has behaved like a hero, a 
patriot, and a general ; and that for his cool, deliber- 
ate, skillful, and gallant conduct in the battle of 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 271 

Tippecanoe, lie well deserves the Wiirmest thanks of 
his country and his nation." 

Mr. Speaker, the resolution I have just read was 
presented by John J. Crittenden, now a Senator from 
the State of Kentucky, whom to name is to call to 
the minds of all who know him, a man whose 
urbanity and varied accomplishments present a 
model of an American gentleman— whose wisdom, 
eloquence, and integrity have won for him the first 
rank among American statesmen. Such a man, with 
both branches of the Kentucky Legislature, have 
testified, two months only after the event took place, 
that, in the campaign and battle of Tippecanoe, G-en- 
eral Harrison combined the skill and conduct of an 
able commander with the valor of a soldier, and the 
patriotism of an American. Who rises up, twenty- 
eight years afterward, to contradict this ? The young 
gentleman from Michigan! He who, at the time 
referred to, was probably conning Webster's spelling- 
book in some village school in Connecticut. But, 
Mr. Speaker, I must call another witness upon the 
point in issue here. On the 12th of November, 1811, 
the Territorial Legislature of Indiana was in session. 
This is just five days after the battle. That Legisla- 
ture, through the Speaker of its House of Represent- 
atives, General William Johnson, addressed General 
Harrison in the following terms : 

"Sir: The House of Representatives of the Indiana 
Territory, in their own name, and in behalf of their 
constituents, most cordially reciprocate the congratu- 
lations of your Excellency on the glorious result of 



-72 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIX. 

the late sanguinary conflict with the Shawnee Pro- 
phet, and all the tribes of Indians confederated with 
him. When we see displayed in behalf of our coun- 
try not only the consummate abilities of the general, 
but the heroism of the man ; and when we take into 
view the benefits which must result to that country 
from those exertions, w^e can not for a moment with- 
hold our meed of applause." 

Here, sir, we have two Legislatures of the States 
whose citizens composed the militia force at Tippe- 
canoe, grieved and smarting under the loss of their 
fellow-citizens, uniting in solemn council in bearing 
their testimony to the skill and bravery displayed by 
General Harrison in that battle, which the gentle- 
man from Michigan, with a self-complacency that 
might well pass for insanity, now says he has discov- 
ered was marked by palpable incapacity in the com- 
manding General. But, JNIr. Speaker, I must call 
yet another, na}^, several other witnesses, to confront 
the opinion of the Michigan General. 

In August, 1812, about nine months after the 
battle of Tippecanoe, news of fearful import concern- 
ing the conduct of General Hull, reached Ohio and 
Kentucky. Our army had fallen back on Detroit, 
and rumors of the surrender of that place to the 
British, which did actually take place, were floating 
on every breeze. Three regiments of militia were 
immediately raised in Kentucky. Before these troops 
had taken the field, it was well known that our army 
under Hull, with the whole Territory of Michigan, 
had been surrendered to the combined British and 



EEPLY TO GENEEAL CEAEY. 273 

Indian forces, commanded by Brock and Tecumseli. 
Our whole frontier in the North-west hiy bare and 
defenseless to the invasion not only of the British 
army, but the more terrible incursion of a savage 
foe, hungry for plunder and thirsting for blood, led 
on by the most bold and accomplished w^arrior that 
the tribes of the red-man had ever produced. In 
this state of peril, the gallant army of Kentucky 
looked round for a leader equal to the imminent and 
momentous crisis. There was Scott, the then Gov- 
ernor of Kentucky, who had fought through the 
Revolutionary war, and under the eye of Wash- 
ington had risen to the rank of brigadier in the regu- 
lar service. There, too, was the veteran Shelby, one 
of the heroes of King's Mountain, a name that shall 
wake up the tones of enthusiam in every American 
heart while heroic courage is esteemed, or lofty integ- 
rity remains a virtue. There, too, was Clay, wdiose 
trumpet tongue in this hall was worth a thousand 
cannon in the field. These were convened in council. 
This, let us not forget, was about nine months after 
the battle of Tippecanoe. Whom, sir, I ask, did 
these men select to lead their own fi'iends and fellow- 
citizens on to this glorious enterprise ? Their laws 
required that their militia should be commanded by 
one of their own citizens ; yet passing by Scott,\ and 
Shelby, and thousands of their own brave sons, this 
council called General Harrison, then Governor of 
Indiana — he who had commanded Kentuckians but 
nine months before at Tippecanoe — he Avho, accord- 
ing to the gentleman from Michigan, had shown no 
18 



274 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

trait but imbecility, as an officer — he, against the 
laws of Kentucky, was by such a council asked to 
resign his station as Governor of Indiana, and take 
the rank and commission of Major-Greneral in the 
Kentucky militia, and lead on her armies in that 
fearful hour, to redeem our national disgrace, and 
snatch from British domination and savage butchery 
the very country now represented by the gentleman 
from Michigan. I have yet one other witness to call 
against the gentleman from Michigan. Sir, if the 
last rest of the illustrious dead is disturbed in this 
unnatural war upon a living soldier's honor, and a 
living patriot's fame, the fault is not mine. It will 
appear presently that the gentleman from Michigan 
has — unwittingly, it may be — dishonored and in-, 
suited the dead, and charged the pure and venerated 
Madison with hypocrisy and falsehood. If General 
Harrison had been the weak, wicked, or imbecile 
thing the gentleman from Michigan would now pre- 
tend, was not this known to Mr. Madison, then Presi- 
dent of the United States, who gave the orders under 
which General Harrison acted, and to whom the lat- 
ter was resj^onsible for his conduct ? Surely no one 
can suppose that there were wanting those who, if 
they could have done so with truth, would have made 
known any conduct of General Harrison at the time 
referred to, which seemed in any degree worthy of 
reprehension. With all these means of information, 
what was the testimony of Mr. Madison respecting 
the battle of Tippecanoe? I will quote his own 
words from his message to Congress about a month 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 275 

after the event. The message is dated 18tli Decem- 
ber, 1811, and reads as follows : 

"While it is deeply lamented that so many valu- 
able lives have been lost in the action which took 
place on the 7th ultimo, Congress will see with satis- 
faction the dauntless spirit of fortitude victoriously 
displayed by every description of troops engaged, as 
well as the collected firmness which distinguished 
their commander on an occasion requiring the utmost 
exertions of valor and discipline." 

Mr. Speaker, I have no pleasure in thus recapitu- 
lating and piling proof upon proof to repel an insinu- 
ation, which I think is now apj^arent to all has been 
thrown out in the madness of party rage, without 
consideration, and founded only on a total perver- 
sion, or rather flat contradiction, of every historical 
record having relation to the subject. 

Something was said by the gentleman from Michi- 
gan about the encampment at Tippecanoe. If I 
understood him rightly, he condemned it as injudi- 
cious, because it had a river on one side and a, 
morass on another. 'Now, Mr. Speaker, I shall give 
no opinion on the question thus stated; but it just 
now occurs to me that this very subject, which I 
think in the military vocabulary is called castrameta- 
tion, admits of some serious injury bearing upon the 
criticism under consideration. In almost all scientific 
research, we find that what is now reduced to system, 
and arises to the dignity of science, was at first the 
product of some casualty, which, falling under the 
notice of some reflecting mind, gave rise to surprising 



276 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

results. The accidental falling of an apple developed 
the great law of gravitation. I am sure I have 
somewhere seen it stated that Pyrrhus, the celebrated 
King of Epirus, who is allowed by all authority to 
have been the first general of his time, first learned 
to fortify his camp by having a river in his rear and 
a morass on his flank ; and this was first suggested 
to him, by seeing a wild boar, when hunted to des- 
j)eration, back himself against a tree or rock, that he 
might fight his pursuers, without danger of being- 
assailed in his rear. Now, sir, if I comprehend the 
gentleman from Michigan, he has against him on this 
point not only the celebrated king of Epirus, but also 
the wild boar, who, it seems, was the tutor of P^^rrhus 
in the art of castrametation. Here, then, are two 
approved authorities, one of whom nature taught the 
art of war, as she kindly did us colonels, and the 
other that renowned hero of Epirus, who gave the 
Komans so much trouble in his time. These author- 
ities are near two thousand years old, and, as far as 
I know, unquestioned, till the gentleman from Michi- 
gan attacked them yesterday. Here, again, I ask 
who shall decide? Pyrrhus and the boar on one 
side, and the gentleman from Michigan on the other. 
Sir, I decline jurisdiction of the question, and leave 
the two hundred and forty colonels of this House to 
settle the contest, '■''non nostrum tantes comiwnerc 
IHesr 

Mr. Speaker, I feel it quite impossible to withdraw 
from this part of the debate, without some comment 
on another assertion, or rather intimation, of the jren- 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 277 

tleman from Michigan, touching the conduct of Gen- 
eral Harrison at the battle of the Thames. All who 
have made themselves acquainted with the history 
of that event, know that the order which the Ameri- 
can army was to attack the combined force of British 
and Indians at the Thames was changed at the very 
moment when the onset was about to be made. This 
order of the Greneral drew forth from Commodore 
Perry and others, who were in the staff of the army, 
and on the ground at the time, the highest encomiums. 
The idea of this change in the plan of attack, it is 
now intimated, was not original with General Harri- 
son, but was, as the gentleman seems to intimate, 
sugge^lred to him by another, who, it is said, was on 
the ground at the time. Who that other person is, 
or was, the gentleman has not said, but seemed to 
intin^te he was now in the other end of the Capitol! 
and thus we are led to suppose that the gentleman 
intends to say that Colonel Johnson, the Vice Presi- 
dent, is the gentleman alluded to. Sir, I regret very 
much that the gentleman should treat historical facts 
in this way. If there be any foundation for giving 
Colonel Johnson the honor of having suggested to 
General Harrison a movement for which the latter 
has received great praise, why not speak out and say 
so? Why insinuate? Why hint or suppose on a 
subject susceptible of easy and positive proof? Does 
not the gentleman know that he is thus trifling with 
the character of a soldier, playing with reputation 
dearer than property or life to its possessor ? Sir, I 



278 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

wish to know if Colonel Johnson, the Vice President 
of the United States, has, by any word or act of his, 
given countenance to this insinuation? It would be 
well for all who speak at random on this subject to 
remember that there are living witnesses yet who 
can testify to the point in question. It may not bo 
amiss to remind some that there is extant a journal 
of Colonel Wood, who afterward fell on the Niagara 
frontier. For the benefit of such, I too, will state 
what can be proved in relation to the change made 
by General Harrison in the order of attack at the 
Thames. ^ 

The position of the British and Indians had been 
reported to General Harrison by volunteer ofiicers — 
brave men, it is true, but who, like many of us, were 
officers who had not seen a great deal of hard fight- 
ing. On this report the order of attack first intehded 
was founded, but, before the troops were ordered on 
the attack. Colonel Wood was sent to examine and 
report the extent of front occupied by the British 
troops. Colonel Wood's military eye detected at 
once what had escaped the unpracticed observation 
of the others — that is, that the British regulars were 
drawn up in open order — and it was on his report 
that, at the moment, the change was made by Gen- 
eral Harrison in the order of the attack — a move- 
ment which, in the estimation of such men as Wood, 
and Perry, and Shelby, was enough of itself to entitle 
General Harrison to the highest rank am.ong the 
military men of the age. 



REPLY TO GENERAL CRARY. 279 

Mr. Speaker, when I review the historical testi- 
mony touching this portion of General Harrison's 
history, I confess my amazement at the Quixotic, 
(I pray my friend from Michigan to pardon me), 
but I must call it the Quixotic exhibition which he 
has made of himself. Sir, the gentleman had no 
need to tell us he was a general of militia. His con- 
duct, in this discussion, is proof of that — strong even 
as is his own word for the fact. He has shown all 
that reckless bravery which has always characterized 
our noble militia, but he has also, in this attack, shown 
that other quality of militia troops which so frequently 
impels them to rush blindly forward, and often to 
their OAvn destruction. I should like to hear many 
of the brave men around me speak of General Har- 
rison. Some there are now under my eye who carry 
British bullets in their bodies, received while fighting 
under the command of General Harrison. I should 
be glad to hear my w^hole-souled and generous-hearted 
friend from Kentucky [Major Butler], who agrees 
with the gentleman from Michigan in general politics, 
who has not merely heard of battle, but who has 
mingled in war in all its forms, and fought his way 
from the ranks up to the head of a battalion — I say 
I should be glad to hear his opinions of the matters 
asserted, hinted at, and insinuated by the gentleman 
from Michigan. 

Why, I ask, is this attempt to falsify the common 
history of our country made now, and why is it made 
here? ' Is it vainly imagined that Congressional 



280 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

speeches are to contradict accredited, long-known 
historical facts? Does the fierce madness of party 
indulge a conception so wild ? 

Sir, I repeat, that I feel only amazement at such 
an attempt. I could not sit still and witness it in 
silence. Much as I desired to speak to the House 
and the country on the question touching the Cum- 
berland road, I should hare left it to others had I 
not been impelled to get the floor to bear my testi- 
mony against the gross injustice which I thought was 
about to be done to a citizen — an honored, cherished 
citizen of my own State. This House, Mr. Speaker, 
knows that I am not given to much babbling here. 
Yes, sir, you all know that, like Balaam's ass, I 
never speak here till I am kicked into it. I may 
claim credit, therefore, for sincerity, when I declare 
that a strong sense of justice alone could have called 
me into this debate. Let me now remind gentlemen 
who may be tempted into a similar course with my 
friend from Michigan, that all such efforts must 
recoil with destructive effect upon those who make 
them. Sir, it has been the fortune of General Har- 
rison to be identified with the civil and military his- 
tory of this country for nearly half a century. What 
is to be gained, even to party, by perverting that 
history ? JS'othing. You may blot out a j^age of his 
biography here, and tear out a chapter of history 
there ; nay, you may, in the blindness of party rage, 
rival the Vandal and the Turk, and burn up all your 
books, and what then have you effected? JS'othing 



EErLY TO GEXEEAL CKARY. 281 

but an insane exhibition of impotent party violence. 
General Harrison's history would still remain in the 
memory of his and your cotemporaries ; and coming 
events, not long to be delayed, will show to the world 
that his history, in both legislation and war, dAvells 
not merely in the memories of his countrymen, but 
is enshrined in their gratitude and engraven upon 
their hearts. 

Mr. Speaker, I come now to the discussion of what 
is really the question before the House, and with the 
hope that I may be entitled to the floor on Monday, 
I will, if it be the pleasure of the House, give way 
for a motion to adjourn. If I can obtain the floor on 
Monday, I j^romise the House that nothing shall 
tempt me to wander from the question touching the 
appropriation for the Cumberland road, a work 
which, if it be not crushed by the wretched policy 
of the Administration, will reflect as much glory 
upon your civil history as the deeds of the great and 
patriotic citizen whose conduct I have been com- 
pelled to notice, ever did upon your military annals. 

[At this point the House adjourned until the following Mon- 
day, when Mr. Corwin resumed, but his remarks were never 
fully reported. 



INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 

[Delivered to tte Legislature of Ohio, December 16tli, 1840. ] 



Gentlemen of the Senate 

AND House op Representatives : 
Having been properly advised of my election to 
the office of Governor of the State, I am here, in 
obedience to the law, to enter upon the discharge of 
those duties which the constitution and laws of Ohio 
devolve upon that officer. 

Few and comparatively unimportant as are the 
duties which our constitution has assigned to the 
chief executive magistrate of the State, still it is 
obvious that an upright and faithful discharge of 
these is due to the interests as well as the just 
expectations of the people. 

While I am fully impressed with that truth, so 
prominent in all systems of representative govern- 
ment, that every public functionary, chosen by the 
people, is but the instrument selected for the execu- 
tion of those principles of government wlr >h prompt 
the bestowment of their suffrages upon Q^m, yet I 
can not omit the present as the most proper occasion 
for expressing the deep sense I entertain of the honor 
which, in this instance, that selection has conferred 
upon me. The grateful recollection which I shall 
(282) 



INAUGUEAL ADDRESS. 283 

ever cherish of this distinguished testimonial of its 
confidence, with the interest I can not but feel, in 
common with every citizen, for the advancement of 
the lasting prosperity and true glory of the State, 
will, I trust, furnish at all times adequate motives 
to myself, and sure guarantees to the people, for at 
least an honest and faithful effort in all things fall- 
ing within the constitutional limits of executive duty. 
The narrow limits within which the executive power 
is circumscribed by the constitution of Ohio, has been 
the subject of much curious speculation — of no little 
censure by some, and of high encomium by others, 
Neither the Constitution of the United States, nor 
those of few, if any, of the States in the Union, 
furnish a parallel to this strongly-defined feature 
in ours. With us the executive has no agency 
whatever in the enactment of laws, except the very 
feeble and humble one, if agency it may be called, of 
" recommending such measures as he may deem expe- 
dient." The laws, when passed through both branches 
of the Legislature, are not submitted for executive 
approval, nor has he, in any contingency, that " veto 
power " which, by one class of political philosophers, 
has been deemed essential to protect the people 
against a supposed hasty, impolitic, or unconstitu- 
tional action of the legislative department. Except 
in one or two instances of very subordinate char- 
acter, the power of appointment to office by the 
Governor is limited to such vacancies as may occur 
in the recess of the Legislature; and such appoint- 
ments, when made, expire, by express limitation, at 



284 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN 

the close of the next succeeding session of that body. 
The admirers of a strong executive have, in my 
judgment, most erroneously supposed that a large 
patronage, resulting from the power of appointment 
to office, was a necessary branch of executive power, 
in order to give stability to the Government, and 
secure a prompt and faithful execution of the laws. 
The denial of this, as well as the -veto jjoiver, to the 
Executive by our constitution (forming, as they do, a 
striking peculiarity), can probably only be rationally 
accounted for by reference to the history of the times 
which gave it birth. 

The constitution of Ohio was formed in JS^ovember, 
1802, very soon after a most animated struggle be- 
tween two great political parties in the United States, 
which had resulted in the election of Mr. Jefferson to 
the Presidency. Of the questions which divided the 
people of that day, that touching the powers and 
patronage of the Executive was j^rominent. They 
w^ho favored a restricted power, and stinted execu- 
tive patronage, prevailed ; and of this school (then 
denominated Republican) was the convention that 
framed our Constitution. A fearful jealousy of execu- 
tive power, with a strong conviction of the pernicious 
influence of executive patronage, all will agree, are 
indelibly impressed upon their work ; and our expe- 
rience of nearly forty years has given abundant 
proofs of the wisdom which (in this respect at least) 
exerted its influence upon their labors. Under this 
system, Ohio, it is believed, has advanced, with a 
pace equal to any of her sister States, in the augmen- 



INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 285 

tation of her population and the development of 
lier resources ; nor in those laws and social insti- 
tutions which advance the intellectual and moral 
condition of a people, need she fear a comparison 
with much older communities, governed b}^ diiferent 
organic laws. Under this constitution, the rights of 
person and property have been fully protected ; all 
the great guarantees of civil liberty have been pre- 
served; and, in the vicissitudes of war and peace, 
the laws have, in general, been promptly and vigor- 
ously enforced. If occasional and even flagrant 
exceptions to this view of our history are to be 
found, it will be readily seen that they were of short 
duration, and had not their origin in the want of 
executive power to prevent or control them. After 
an interval of forty years, the people of the United 
States have again agitated the subject of a strong or 
restricted executive action in the Federal Govern- 
ment, and again decided it as they did in 1800 — • 
furnishing to the citizen of Ohio another proud testi- 
monial of the excellence, in this particular, of the 
constitution under which he lives. 

I advert to this subject now Avith no view to par- 
ticular legislation, but upon the supposition that a 
contingency may arise when it may become the duty 
of the Legislature to express, in the usual way, the 
opinions of the State upon it, in reference to some 
modification of the executive power, as defined in the 
Constitution of the United States. 

Under our complex system of government, no sub- 
jc»'t has given rise to greater difficulty, or variety of 



286 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIK 

oj^inion, than that of the true division of legislative 
power, under the Constitution, between the General 
Government and the States. 

On all subjects of this character, prudence and 
patriotism alike demand that both parties should 
forbear, if possible, to enter the field of conflict in 
pursuit of a questionable claim of jurisdiction. That 
spirit of concession, so powerfully operative in the 
formation of the Federal Constitution, should always 
be invoked by those whose duty it may be, either as 
officers of the General or State authorities, to fix its 
true interpretation. When we regard, however, the 
invariable tendency of power to reach after still 
further and more extended dominion, and when we 
consider the obvious advantage which the National 
Government enjoys in a conflict with a single State 
of the Union, arising from its greater wealth and 
patronage, and by consequence its superior influence 
over public opinion, it becomes the obvious duty ol 
the State Legislatures to watch with vigilance, and, 
on all questions not within the province of the judi- 
ciary, to assert, in a peaceful yet resolute tone, the 
claims and powers of the weaker party. 

The present financial condition of our State, as 
u'ell as the intrinsic importance of the subject, will, 
I am sure, justify me in bestowing, at this time, a 
passing notice on a claim often preferred by Ohio, 
with many other States in the Union, the adjustment 
of which, though at one time on the point of com- 
pletion, still remains a subject open for the considera- 
tion and final action of Cono-ress. 



INAUGURAL ADDEESS. 287 

Several years ago, Congress, by very full majorities 
in both branches, passed an act providing for dis- 
tributing the moneys arising from the sale of the 
public lands among the States. This act was predi- 
cated upon the proposition that the public lands were 
held by Congress in trust; that tlie objects of the 
trust -.vere specified in the deeds of cession compre- 
hending these lands ; that these deeds of cession 
were compacts ; that the parties to these compacts 
had agreed that the lands so ceded should be sold by 
the General Government, and the moneys arising 
from the sale should be appropriated to the payment 
of the then national debt, and then the remainder 
should be distributed among the several States of 
the Union in a specified proportion. At the time of 
the passage of this bill, the national debt was entirely 
extinguished, and it was believed by Congress that 
the contingency had occurred iq^on which the dis- 
tribution among the States should commence. This 
argument, derived from the notion of a compact 
embracing the subject-matter of the bill, did not 
comprehend that portion of the public domain em- 
braced within the purchase of Louisiana and Florida, 
ceded directly to the General Government by France 
and Spain respectively. 

The propriety of subjecting this last class to the 
principle of distribution was founded on a variety of 
considerations. It was believed by many, whose 
opinions are entitled to great consideration, that the 
pul^lic domain was not properly, nor ever should be, 
considered a source of revenue to the national trea- 



288 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

sury. A belief then prevailed, to such extent as to 
amount to almost universal admission, that under 
any properly-adjusted system of impost duties on 
foreign goods, the moneys arising from that source 
would be always equal to the wants of the General 
Government in time of peace, while those w^ants 
should be limited by that strict economy and repub- 
lican simplicity which should always characterize 
the institutions of a free people. The principles of 
administration, then and since avowed by the General 
Government, also give to this claim of the States an 
equity which, under other circumstances, might not 
so clearly appear. With very few exceptions, the 
General Government will expend no money out of 
the national treasury for the internal improvement 
of the country. This necessarily left the whole 
expense of prosecuting a system of internal improve- 
ment to be borne by the States, and for Avhich the 
States have contracted debts that bear heavily upon 
their citizens, in the shape of direct taxes. Many 
of the works thus undertaken were of a character 
truly national, and demanded alike by the enter- 
prising spirit of the age, and the true interests of 
the whole country. In the same spirit of enlightened 
patriotism, and believing that our institutions are 
based upon equality, and that every such system 
implies equality in knowledge, and the means of 
attaining to it as nearly as possible ; systems of com- 
mon-school education, carrying its benefits alike to 
the high and the lowly, the rich and the poor, have 
been adopted by many of the States. These impose 



INAUGURAL ADDEESS. 289 

additional taxes upon the people of the States, which, 
though as yet cheerfully paid, I am proud to declare, 
in our State, do, nevertheless, go to promote objects 
of vital import, as well to the nation collectively, as 
the States, considered in their separate and sovereign 
character. Against any approj^riation for this great 
and essential national object, the doors of the Fed- 
eral treasury have been, and probably in all time to 
come will remain, forever closed. These and other 
kindred considerations brought Congress, the legiti- 
mate trustees of the fund, to the conclusion that it 
should be distributed among the States. The Fed- 
eral representation of each was assumed as the most 
equitable rule of distribution, and adopted accord- 
ingly. 

It would seem that the justice and propriety of 
conceding this claim to the States, should not now be 
a question. By the passage of the act to which I 
refer, Congress, the proper trustees of the fund, and 
the only legitimate guardians of the national trea- 
sur}^, has acknowledged the right, and given its sanc- 
tion to the expediency of the measure. The reason, 
and the only reason, why we are not at this moment 
in the enjoyment of our proportion of this rich fund, 
is to be found in the fact, that the President, then in 
the executive chair, refused his assent to the bill for 
that purpose ; thus, by the will of one man, nullify- 
ing the combined resolves of the representatives of 
both the people and the States. It is a singular fact, 
and worthy our attention, as illustrating the operation 
of the veto power of the President, and the influence 
19 



290 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWI^". 

it gives to the opinion of one man over the opinions 
of many, that a majority of the sovereign States of 
the Union have, at various times, insisted on tlie 
distribution of this fund as a matter of policy, and 
many of them as a matter of positive right, and Con- 
gress have, in pursuance of this undoubted expression 
of the wishes of the States and people, enacted a law ; 
and yet, by the simple interposition of the will of one 
other branch of the Government, the will and power 
of the people and the States are rendered of no 
effect. 

Neither duty nor inclination invite me to bring to 
your notice all those subjects to which your attention 
has been called by my predecessor, in the proper dis- 
charge of his duties ; yet, in the present condition of 
our affairs as a State, and in view of the onerous 
taxation, which must continue for some time to press 
heavily on the people, I have -thought it my impera- 
tive duty, at the earliest proper moment, to solicit 
your attention to this subject. 

It is scarcely possible to suggest an idea touching 
the proper revenues of the State, or our prospects 
as a people, without associating with these, in our 
thoughts, the condition of that currency which is tl e 
measure of value, to all property and labor, and 
which, therefore, may be considered as one of the 
indispensable elements of a social state of existence. 
Wherever society has advanced to the point where 
there is such a division of labor, as that the products 
of one become necessary to another, there some 
representative of the value of such exchangeable 



INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 291 

commodities lias been invented. As any community 
advances in population, and multiplies the variety 
and quantity of its productions, this representative 
of value also increases in amount, so as to insure a 
ready and convenient transfer of the labor of one 
portion to another, without the slow, and, in many 
instances, impracticable process of barter between 
the two. Wherever a thriving and industrious com- 
munity, with ample means to apply its labor to 
future acquisitions, has been found, there the pro- 
ceeds of that labor in the future have supplied the 
place of this medium of exchange, in the form of 
credit ; and this last has, by experience, been found 
in general so safe, that in governments where a 
stable order of things prevails, and the rights of the 
citizens are well protected, it has obtained universal 
prevalence. Among the inventions of nations most 
commercial, and farthest advanced in civilization, to 
supply this medium of trade, banks of circulation, 
as modern institutions of that sort are called, have 
borne a conspicuous part. After the experience of 
hundreds of years, since their first appearance, they 
still survive, and may be said, at this time, to be 
more prevalent than at any former period. So 
thoroughly have these institutions been wrought into 
the texture of the affairs of the world, that they have, 
even in our country, been chartered and sustained 
by the common consent of those who differed widely 
on every other great question of public policy. It is 
not now, therefore, a question whether banks shall 
continue among us in Ohio, but only under what 



292 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

modifications and restrictions, they shall be per- 
mitted to live. With three or four exceptions, the 
charters of all the banks in Ohio will expire in two 
years from this time. They have, I believe, at this 
time a debt due them, which, in the aggregate, 
amounts to about ten millions of dollars. If their 
charters are not to be renewed, then it is not merely 
the dictate of prudence, but the command of neces- 
sity, that they should cease to make further issues, 
and by every proper means endeavor to collect their 
debts, and close finally their entire business. Should 
the great curtailment, almost ruinous, which has 
taken place in the circulation of the banks of this 
State, within the last eighteen months, be followed 
by the collection of the debts due the banks, while 
their capital remains unemployed, it must produce a 
state of things in this country, which has never been 
paralleled by any of those contingencies in trade, or 
unusual expansions and contractions in banking, 
which, in former times, we have had occasion to 
deplore. With the present Legislature it remains 
to determine whether the permanent interests of the 
State are to be promoted by encountering such a 
crisis. 

As the establishment of some permanent system 
of banking in this State devolves on the Legislature, 
and as that responsibility and labor must be encoun- 
tered now, and as the subject is one of such per- 
vading and deep moment, I have thought that my 
duty would not be discharged without adding my 
recommendation to the universal expectation of the 



INAUGUEAL ADDRESS. 293 

peoj)le, that it should receive your early and most 
anxious consideration. I am aware that the subject 
has been, and is considered one of great difficulty in 
theory, and hazardous in practice. 

If we analyze all the objections to banks, as instru- 
ments for furnishing a currency, it will be found that 
they resolve themselves mainly into two, which are 
said in practice to be the natural results of the 
system. 

In the first place, it is said that banks use the 
credit which their charters give them to extend the 
circulation of their paper ; that, either from impru- 
dent management, or from fraudulent motives, they 
at times refuse to pay gold or silver for their notes ; 
that this depreciates the value of their paper, and to 
the extent, more or less, of such depreciation, occa- 
sions a loss to the holders of their bills. That 
instances have occurred in the past history of banks, 
to warrant this objection, no one can deny. But it is 
not true that this has been either an invariable or 
general consequence of our system of banking. The 
occurrences upon which this objection is founded, 
have been occasional, with chartered institutions, 
and not general. If we compare the losses sustained 
by the community, fi'om the partial and total failures 
of incorporated banks to redeem their promises, with 
the failures and bankruptcies of individuals engaged 
in trade, to the same extent, we shall find the latter 
exceed those of the former class by an almost incal- 
culable sum. 

That banks under the management of men, like all 



294 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

others of. our race, not perfect, either in integrity or 
wisdom, have sometimes failed, is a fact not less 
rationally inferred, from the imperfection of all 
human institutions, than it is clearly shown, by his- 
torical facts. It could not be exj^ected that any 
contrivance of man, would always and invariably, 
jiroduce the good, and nothing else, which it was 
designed to effect. Our admirable system of govern- 
ment sometimes, through the willful delinquency of 
those to whose care it is intrusted, fails to bring us 
all the blessings it is calculated to bestow ; yet, for 
these occasional failures, no American statesman 
thinks of abandoning our system of republican lib- 
erty, and going back to the royal or despotic govern- 
ment of former times, for a better state of things. 

If the community were deprived of that credit 
which is now furnished by banks, any one conversant 
with the enterprising spirit of our people will at once 
see that individuals and voluntary associations would 
furnish that credit in other forms. It then becomes 
a question, which of these two is safest to the labor- 
ing and producing classes ? If this be the true ques- 
tion, and our experience is not utterly deceptive, its 
solution at once results in favor of incorporated com- 
panies, guarded by every provision which the wisdom 
of the Legislature may suggest. 

The second objection to banks is, that they expand 
their circulation at one time to an unnatural extent, 
and thus raise the price of labor and pro^^erty ; and 
by a sudden withdrawal of that circulation, either 
from necessity or choice, reduce the value of both — 



INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 295 

thus, by reducing the value of the debtor's means of 
payment, in eifect augmenting the amount of the 
creditor's demand against him. That this may be, 
and has been often done by banks, is certainly true; 
but that the same amount of credit in any other 
form, or a sudden influx of the precious metals, and 
its sudden efflux, would produce the same evils, 
is equally true. Instances of the latter kind are 
numerous, and too well known to justify me in 
recapitulating them here, in which banks had not 
the remotest influence ; happening in countries, too, 
where a metallic was the only currency. 

In those instances, however, in which banks have 
produced either of the evils complained of, it is 
worthy of consideration, whether the fault lay in the 
institutions themselves, or originated in an extraneous 
influence exerted upon them. In the notable instance 
of suspension of specie payments by the banks of 
England, in 1797, it is a well-known fact, that an 
order of the King and Council given to the bank, 
produced it, and that it was continued by acts of 
Parliament, from time to time, till the year 1823, 
when, by the judicious arrangements of the bank, it 
resumed payments without producing any derange- 
ment in the commerce of the country, or prejudice to 
the finances of the kingdom. The large issues, and 
consequent susj)ension of the banks in our country, 
which took place from 1812 to 1820, have been, with 
great justice, ascribed to the loans made by the Gov- 
ernment of the banks, which were the only means 
of prosecuting the war; which, returning upon them 



296 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

at the close of the war, with a foreign demand for 
specie, with the faikire in business, at that time, of 
many of their debtors, rendered suspension inevita- 
ble, and in many instances were followed by an ulti- 
mate close of business. Among the causes that 
produced the recent suspensions in 1837, the influence 
of the Government, though by no means intended, 
is nevertheless distinctly perceivable. The whole 
revenues of the General Government were deposited 
with them, under an injunction from the Treasury 
department, to use them as banking capital. A con- 
hdence in their strength, arising from this connection 
with the Government, natural enough, though, as the 
event proved, delusive, contributed greatly to those 
large issues prior to 1837, of which so much com- 
plaint has been made. The contractions, too, which 
have follow^ed, producing the most disastrous eifects 
upon the country, although to a great extent a neces- 
sary consequence of previous over-issues, were, never- 
theless, hastened and pushed too rapidly forward, by 
well-meant endeavors on the part of the Legislature 
to improve the currency. Surveying the past history 
of such institutions, and availing ourselves of a dispas- 
sionate view of our own errors, as well as theirs, we 
may hope that a faithful effort, at this time, to estab- 
lish them on a firm and secure basis, will be attended 
by happy results. To this end I have to suggest a 
brief outline of those plans which appear to embrace 
a preventive of the two great evils I have noticed — 
insolvency of the institutions and consequent loss to 
the community — and unnatural expansions and con- 



INAUGUKAL ADDRES^. 297 

tractions of the currency. The first is a State Bank, 
with a convenient number of branches, at proper 
points in the State, with a capital of such amount as 
the business of the country would seem to require. 
Each branch to own its own stock as its own separate 
property; but to receive its paper from a common 
source, and be subject to the control of a parent 
board chosen by the stockholders of all the branches. 
In this plan, the whole capital employed in the State 
should be bound for the redemption of the notes of 
every branch ; the parent board having power, under 
proper limitations, to control the business of all the 
branches. As the whole capital is to be pledged for 
the liabilities of each separate branch, a board repre- 
senting the capital should have full jDOwer to protect 
it against the mismanagement of those for whose 
conduct in this scheme it is made ultimately respon- 
sible. In this plan, it is proposed to give the State 
a proportion of the stock, not exceeding one-fifth of 
the whole, which should be represented by a corres- 
ponding vote in the election of officers. The books 
of all the institution should be opened at all times to 
the inspection of the parent board, and subject also 
to the inspection at an}"- and all times of the Legisla- 
ture, in such mode as it should direct. The amount 
of circulation at any and all of the branches, to bear 
a proportion to their capital, to be fixed by the Leg- 
islature in the charter. It is especially desirable, 
that the charter should specify the cases, if any, 
on which a forfeiture of the charter should follow, 
and that the facts in such cases should be found by a 



298 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

trial, in proper form, in the judicial courts of the 
State. In this scheme, also, it would seem to be 
proj^er to make the notes of each branch receivable 
in payment of debts at every branch in the State. 
To withdraw from the directory all inducement to 
extravagant and injudicious issues, and to put an end 
to the practice, said to prevail to some extent, of 
adoj^ting improper methods to avoid the provision of 
law, which forbids the receipt of more than six per 
cent, per annum on loans, it should be provided, that 
the amount of dividends, when they exceed a given 
per cent, per annum, should be paid in the State 
Treasury. 

The second plan, which has been much the subject 
of discussion, and which would seem to be a great 
improvement on the existing s3'Stem, embraces the 
proposition of re-chartering so many of the present 
banks of the State, as shall be thought necessary, and 
such of them only, as on thorough examination shall 
be found to be in a sound and healthy condition. 

In this scheme, it is proposed to compel all that 
shall receive charters to unite in the election of a 
Board of Control ; each bank to be entitled to vote in 
proportion to its capital. This board, who may or 
may not hold stock in any bank, as the Legislature 
shall determine, to issue all j^aper, and to sign it by 
officers to be chosen by it; to receive reports from 
each bank at stated periods, embracing all its trans- 
actions, verified by the oaths of its officers. It is 
proposed, also, to vest the board with power to ex- 
amine into the affiiirs of all the banks at stated 



mAUGURAL ADDRESS. 299 

periods, to be fixed by law, and oftener, if they deem 
it necessary, and to close the business of any bank, 
when, in its judgment, such bank had conducted its 
business in such manner as to render it unsafe to 
permit its further continuance, and in all such cases 
the assets of such bank should be transferred to the 
board, for the purpose of liquidating all claims out- 
standing against it. 

In this plan it is also proposed to make the capital 
of each bank, and all of them, who shall accept of 
charters, liable for the debts of every other bank, and 
to compel them to receive the notes of each other at 
all times in payment of debts, and to redeem each its 
proper proportion of the notes of any other that may 
suspend specie payment, or be closed by the Board 
of Control. 

It would also be a salutary provision in this 
scheme, to limit the dividends to stockholders, and 
bring into the State Treasury all the profits arising 
from the operations of the banks above such limita- 
tion, and also to limit in the charter the amount of 
circulation as compared with the capital of the several 
banks. 

I have, as it must be obvious, only thought it ne- 
cessary to sketch an outline of some of the most 
prominent features of the scheme proposed. I have 
been impelled at this, as to some it may seem, un- 
usual time, to bring them to the view of the Legis- 
lature, as the loud call of the people of the State 
summons it to immediate action, of some sort^ upon 
this all-important subject. 



300 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

In either of the phins which are here suggested, 
it is beUeved sufficient guards are provided against 
over-issues, leading to dangerous expansions of the 
currency, while a capital varying from six to ten 
millions of dollars, with all the property of the banks, 
are pledged as a perpetual security to the holders of 
the paper of ever}^ bank, embraced in the scheme. 
It is undoubtedly proper, that the Legislature should 
reserve the power to inspect the books and examine 
into the affairs of the banks, by such agents as they 
may from time to time select, and that the Board of 
Control should make an annual report to the Legis- 
lature, embracing a full statement of the business and 
condition of the banks under its supervision. It is 
important in this, as in every other charter, which 
creates a compact between the State and its citizens, 
that those acts which should work a forfeiture of the 
corporate powers granted, should be specifically 
named, and the mode of judicating such forfeiture 
clearly pointed out. 

It is believed that the establishment of the bank- 
ing capital of the State on a permanent and secure 
basis, might be the means of great occasional relief, 
in the future prosecution of our public works. The 
want of funds for this purpose, arising from the tem- 
porary derangement of the money market abroad, 
could be supplied by the banks of our own State, 
were they assured of the further continuance of their 
charters, on proper principles. 

The losses which have been sustained by con- 
tractors and laborers, at times, occasioned by a failure 



INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 301 

of the State to make punctual and frequent payments, 
might, in such cases, be avoided. They might be 
made useful to the State in this way, in enabling 
it to fulfill, as it always should, with rigid precision, 
its compacts with both its foreign and domestic 
creditors; an object which, it is hoped, will never be 
lost sight of by any who may be charged with the 
preservation of the character and honor of the State. 
The high reputation which our stocks have main- 
tained in the markets of the world, has been earned 
by a scrupulous fidelity in complying with our con- 
tracts. The public imj)rovements of the State, those 
enduring monuments of her enterprise, are the fruits 
of that character. That faith-keeping principle which 
shrinks with abhorrence from the idea of a broken 
promise, is alike the offspring of the pure morality 
of a Christian people, and that lofty public honor 
which is a prominent characteristic of our republican 
institutions. Whatever theoretical speculators upon 
the nature of legislative compacts may argue, he has 
been but a superficial observer of the j^eople of Ohio, 
who does not know that their tax-payers would gladly 
incur taxes fifty fold more burdensome than the pre- 
sent, rather than endure, for a day, the deep disgrace 
which attaches to broken promises and violated pub- 
lic fiiith. Such an idea is the less tolerable in Western 
America, because of its almost boundless resources, 
and the constantly increasing energy and numbers of 
its people. 

Our present position as a member of the Union, 



302 SPEECPIES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

compared with the past, can not fail to awaken in the 
bosoms of our citizens proud and gratifying reflec- 
tions. Our State occu2:)ies a commanding position in 
the great valley west of the Alleghany mountains ; a 
valley which, by the estimates of those well informed, 
contains a greater quantity of productive soil than is 
to be found in one body elsewhere on the surface of 
the globe. Though many parts of Ohio present to 
the eye of a Western American what seems to him a 
crowded population, yet it is certain that when com- 
pared with its capacity to sustain and feed its people, 
no portion of our territory has as yet been filled. If 
we glance our eyes over the statistics of other parts 
of the world, not more fruitful in whatever con- 
tributes to the sustenance of a dense population, and 
see to what extent the productive powers of the earth 
may be carried, where population has long pressed 
upon subsistence, we shall find, that any portion of 
Ohio, compared with such, is as yet little better than 
an untenanted and uncultivated waste. Looking for- 
ward to the time when the yet unoccupied agricul- 
tural and manufacturing powers of the State shall be 
fully developed, and taking our past progress as a 
guide to the future, we may, without egotism, indulge 
proud hopes of the ultimate destinies of the State. 
When we entered upon a State government in the 
year 1802, our population numbered sixty thousand. 
Now, after a lapse of thirty-eight years, we count a 
million and a half within our borders. Then we 
were a few scattered settlements, trembling in the 



INAUGUEAL ADDRESS. 303 

presence of the lately subdued Indian tribes that still 
hovered on our frontier, and were entitled to but one 
representative in the popular branch of Congress ; 
now we rank third in numbers among the twenty-six 
States of the Union, and have a larger share of power 
in the Legislature of the Nation, than many of the 
oldest States, whose settlements began two hundred 
years before the white man built his first cabin 
within the limits of the State. 

Through the valley lying between the Rocky 
Mountains on one side, and the Alleghany range 
on the other, following the course of the Mississippi, 
Ohio, and Alleghany rivers, we have an uninter- 
rupted steamboat navigation of twenty-four hundred 
miles in length. This great channel of commerce on 
one side, and the lakes of the north on the other, 
intersected by canals, roads, and rivers, with a rich 
soil and healthful climate, while they account for 
our past history, furnish certain and most cheering 
augury of our future progress. 

The direction which shall be given to that future, 
mider our Constitution, mainly de23ends upon the 
legislative department. To subject to useful pur- 
poses all the physical resources of the State, and 
through these to insure the great ends of our exist- 
ence, the moral and intellectual improvement of all 
the people, to the highest attainable point ; these are 
the great objects of legislative regard. To the Legis- 
lature belongs the lofty glories that await a wise 
exertion of that power ; and on it devolves, also, the 



304 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

fearful responsibilities which its high position im- 
poses. 

Fully assured, that your deliberations will all aim 
to advance the interests, and secure the happiness of 
our common constituents, as it has become my dut}". 
so shall it be my greatest pleasure, within my proper 
sphere, to extend a most hearty co-operation. 



ON THE ARMY BILL— BOUNTY LANDS TO 
SOLDIERS. 

[Pending tlie discussion of the bill for the Increase of the 
Army, in the U. S. Senate, January 14th, 1847, Mr. Cameron, of 
Pennsylvania, submitted an additional section, enacting — "That 
the Secretary of the Treasury be directed to issue a warrant for a 
half section of land to every officer, non-commissioned officer, mu- 
sician, and private, who shall servo in the Army of the United 
States during the present war with Mexico, or shall volunteer and 
enlist to serve during the war, and shall be honorably discharged 
before its termination ; the said land warrants to be located upon 
any land belonging to the United States that may be subject to 
private entry." 

This section was, in substance, generally approved, but objected to 
by influential senators, as tending to retard the passage of the Army 
bill, or that it was, as they alleged, imperfect in its provisions.] 

Mr. Corwin said he felt somewhat solicitous that 
this measure, in some form or other, and at some 
time or other, should be passed into a law, and he 
thought, if gentlemen would give it some attention, 
they would find it not so very imperfect ; they would 
find that it steered clear entirely of all those formid- 
able objections, in regard to the system of bounty 
lands, as developed in practice heretofore. The 
reason why those juarticular sections of country where 
those bounty lands were to be located had been over- 
looked, could not possibly apply to the lands now 
proposed to be granted by the Senator from Pennsyl- 
vania. The lands in those particular instances, and 
20 (305) 



306 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

in all tlie laws, he believed, which were passed for 
the enlistment of soldiers in the war of 1812, were to 
be located in a particular place ; the result was, that 
no one who did not choose to make that place his 
residence, would purchase them. The prices sank, 
therefore, to about twenty dollars for each grant. 
This arose from the system of location adopted by 
the Grovernment. But this was not the case here. 
These were to be located in any place where there 
were lands subject to private entry, and that would 
comprehend a district large enough to furnish a wide 
range for choice. The result of the passage of this 
amendment, then, would be simply this : that every 
soldier who should be honorably discharged, or having 
served during the war, or volunteered for twelve 
months, would, at the end of his term of service, be 
entitled to so much scrip as would purchase one hun- 
dred and sixty acres of land.* It was a proposition 
to grant to every soldier who actually served, and to 
the heirs of every soldier who died in service, an 
amount equal to $200, which should pass current in 
any land office for the purchase of land, instead of 
paying them in advance : it was paying him, at the 
end of his service, this amount. He himself would 
have no hesitation in voting for such a proposition. 
A soldier's service was the hardest that any patriot 
could be called upon to perform, and he thought that 
they were entitled to receive at the hands of the Grov- 

*Mr. Cameron's proposition had been modified wlien these re- 
marks were made. 



BOUNTY LANDS TO SOLDIERS. 307 

ernment this much at least. He did not like procras- 
tinating this subject until this bill should be passed. 
He saw no objection to its being incorporated in it. 
Would the passage of that bill alone bring the men 
into the field ? The army was not half full ; would 
that supply the deficiency? Wliy, if the thing were 
suggested in any other place, it would be called a 
palpable absurdity! If this bill were to pass, to 
what family of legislation would it belong ? It was 
the very bill to which such a provision as that pro- 
posed by the Senator from Pennsylvania properly 
belonged. 

[On the 19th January, Mr. Benton reported from the Senate 
Committee on Military Affairs, to which the bill had been re- 
committed, with instructions to bring in an amendment granting 
Bounty Lands, and which, having been lost by a tie vote after 
some discussion, Mr. Corwin offered the following substitute: 

" That each non-commissioned officer or private enlisted in the 
regular army, or regularly mustered in any volunteer company, 
who has served, or may serve during the present war with 
Mexico, and who shall at the end of his term of service, receive 
an honorable discharge, shall be entitled to receive a certificate 
or warrant from the War Department for one hundred and sixty 
acres of land, which may be located by the warrantee, his heirs 
or legal representatives, at any land office in the United States, 
in one body, in conformity to the legal subdivisions of the public 
lands, in such districts as are then subject to private entry ; Pro- 
vided, That if the full term for which such person shall have 
volunteered shall not exceed one year, then the warrant to be 
for eighty acres. In case of death in service, or after his dis- 
charge, then the certificate to go — first, to the widow; second, 
to the children; third, his father; fourth, his mother; and fifth, 
his brothers and sisters."] 



308 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

Mr. Corwin said he merely desired to say to the 
Senate what was the difference between his substitute 
and the report of the committee. The object which 
already had been urged from various quarters of the 
Senate, to grant lands to the soldiers, he should say 
nothing about, because he conceived that the mind 
of every Senator was made up on that subject. His 
princij)al objection to the bill which had been reported 
from the Military committee was, the restraints which 
it imposes on alienations of the land after it had been 
acquired by the soldier; and he took that exception 
to it, in view of the princij^le upon which he supposed 
the Senate was acting in granting these donations at 
all. It was intended, as had been well observed by 
the Senator from Massachusetts, [Mr. Webster], to 
operate as an inducement to those whom we now 
solicit to enter the military service of the country. 
'Now, he thought a very little reflection on the char- 
acter and pursuits of those who were likely to enter 
the volunteer or regular service, would satisfy any 
man that the grant of a quarter section of land to be 
received by them at the end of their term of service, 
and to be inalienable by them, and, consequently, 
useless to them for the term of seven years, was not 
an inducement equivalent to that offered by the 
amendment which he had proposed. He would not 
pretend to be very accurate in the construction he 
had been able to put on the words employed in order 
to impose these restraints on alienation, but he 
thought he w^as not mistaken in this, that when the 
certificate for a quarter section of land shall be 



BOUNTY LANDS TO SOLDIERS. 309 

issued, it does not endow the holder of it with a right 
to dispose of it until the end of seven years, when a 
patent will be issued; and it prohibits him from 
making any use of it whatever, either by lien, col- 
lection of money by agreement for the occupation of 
the land, or any means whatever. In short, it was 
perfectly useless to him for seven years after his 
term of service, and also during that time, if he had 
not misunderstood the bill, the land was subject to 
taxation. 'No bond could be made, no agreement 
entered into by him for leasing it, or for the occupa- 
tion of it in any way. It was simply saying to him 
that he should, within seven years from the expira- 
tion of his term of service, have a quarter section of 
land, and in the meantime he should pay taxes on it, 
without his being able to make any conceivable use 
of it, except he would go and reside upon it himself; 
for if he made any agreement, in any way, to remu- 
nerate him for the taxes which he might pay on that 
land, it could not be enforced. 

Now, he presumed no one would pretend to deny 
that a very considerable proportion of those who were 
likely to enter the service, either as volunteers or as 
regular soldiers, would be found to belong to some of 
the trades or mechanical pursuits which were com- 
mon to the men of this country. He thought he was 
not mistaken when he said one entire company raised 
in the State of Massachusetts, consisted altogether of 
mechanics — printers, tailors, shoemakers, and hat- 
ters. Now, what inducement did they propose to a 
man accustomed all his lifetime to work in mechan- 



310 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIj!^. 

ical pursuits, when they oifered him a certificate for 
a quarter section of land, on which he woukl have to 
pay taxes for seven years, which he must then make 
avaihible to him, and not before ? Did they expect a 
shoemaker to go into the Western forests with the 
chopping-ax, or any of the other trades to engage in 
pursuits so uncongenial with those to which they had 
been accustomed ? But according to this bill no man 
could do it for him, for every agreement made for 
lien or transfer, was void. All these classes of soci- 
ety, then, would have no inducements at all ; for, as 
the distinguished Senator from Missouri has said, it 
would make twenty thousand men, after making war 
on the Mexicans, march into the far West and make 
war on the forests. It was compulsory on them to 
do so, under the penalty of twenty thousand quarter 
sections of land. 

Xow, Mr. C.'s object was to make the land alien- 
able, and thus hold out a proper and adequate induce- 
ment. He knew very well that the Senator from 
Missouri had this object perhaps much more at heart 
than he (Mr. C.) had. They all aimed at the same 
thing. His amendment proj^osed to give a quarter 
section of land, or a warrant which would be worth 
that, to all who served for twelve months, at the 
expiration of his term of service. It might be 
located anywhere. It was so much scrip which was 
receivable in pa^nnent for jjublic lands. That quar- 
ter section, instead of being taken up in tracts of forty 
or fifty acres each, by his amendment was j^roposed 
to be one tract ; and to those who had not served 



BOUNTY LANDS TO SOLDIERS. 311 

twelve montlis, to meet the views of the Senator 
from Missouri, he gave eighty acres of land, or a 
warrant for that quantity, which would be land 
scrip equal to one hundred dollars, estimating the 
land at the present rate of $1,25 per acre. This, 
then, would operate exactly as so much money paid 
'into the hands of the soldiers, or agreed to be paid. 

Mr. C. appealed, as the Senator from Massachu- 
setts had done, to their experience in the war of 
1812. He thought it would be found, on a recurrence 
to the statute, that during that time three hundred 
and twenty acres were received at one time ; but 
even three hundred and twenty acres of bounty land 
were found not to produce the desired result, and a 
bounty in money was found to be better, for that 
alone succeeded in filling up the ranks. If, then, 
their experience was worth anything, the proposition 
to give land to the extent proposed by the committee 
would be found to be insufficient. But bv convertino* 
it into money, or the equivalent of money, and mak- 
ing it inalienable or untransferable until his term of 
service expires, the soldier would get what they pro- 
posed he should realize, and they would attain the 
great object desired by all. 

[ After further discussion, Mr. Benton inquired of Mr. C. 
What is the meaning of "legal representatives?"] 

Mr. Corwin said it was a great while since he had 
been examined for admission to the bar, when such a 
question might have been proper. If the Senator 
from Missouri made the inquiry for his own informa- 



312 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

tion, he (Mr. C), would rather refer him to the 
library. But if he simply inquired what my opinion is 
of the meaning of the phrase "legal representatives," 
I will say to him that I mean those persons who 
represent the estate of a dead man after he is dead. 

[Incidental remarks were here made by Senators, wlien Mr. 
Corwin continued.] 

He felt, when he offered this amendment, the full 
force of the suggestions which had just been made by 
the Senator from Missouri ; and he would add that 
it had never been subject to the action of the Senate, 
though he knew that its general principle had been 
before the committee, and must necessarily have 
been discussed by them. 

Mr. C. wished now to modify his amendment by 
striking out those words which were objectionable 
to the Senator from Maryland [Mr. R.. Johnson]. 
When he drew up this paper he thought this bounty 
of the Government ought to be confined to those 
who shall perform service in this Mexican war. He 
would, however, now modify his amendment, as had 
been suggested, leaving the bounty to apply to all 
who enter the service and perform duty during the 
Mexican war. 

[January 20th, 1847 — same subject.] 

Mr. Corwin replied [to Senators] that the bill was 
intended to meet every case. The gentleman would 
see that all who were honorably discharged were pro- 
vided for, if they had been in the service for three 
months. 



BOUNTY LAND TO SOLDIEES. 313 

He desired [after remarks by Senators Chalmers 
and Bagly] to explain a difficulty which had been 
suggested by the Senator from Indiana [Mr. Hanne- 
gan], and which had presented itself to his own 
mind. In granting bounties he admitted that some 
respect should be paid to the length of service, so 
that it should not aj^pear to be a mere gratuity to 
the troops, but that the bounty should bear some 
relation to the service rendered. In the further 
prosecution of the war, it was not likely that the 
troops would be raised, whether regular soldiers or 
volunteers, but for longer periods of service — the 
former for five years, and the latter during the war. 
As the principal object of this bill was therefore 
prospective, and the design to recruit the army 
speedily, it did appear to him that there should not 
be a greater bounty given to those who enter during 
the war, now pending, than to those who went into it 
without any other motive than the laws furnished at 
the time they entered into the service. Now, he sup- 
posed that every one who was acquainted with the 
generosity of the Senator from Indiana [Mr. Hanne- 
gan] , knew that if he could do it from his own pri- 
vate purse, he would be willing to bestow on the 
soldier any gratuity that might be necessary; but 
when they were disposing of the money in the public 
treasury, it appeared to him that they should be 
careful to give only in cases where it was necessary 
to make some compensation to those who were to 
receive it. And in making compensation, they must 
also make a discrimination between those who have 



314 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

served but a limited time, and those whose service 
has been longer. 

Again, there was some misunderstanding on an- 
other point. Now, he contended that his amendment 
did, in fact and in substance, give to a soldier receiv- 
ing a land-warrant a money-warrant — dollars and 
cents — restricting it to this, that it was only receiv- 
able in payment of public land. It was land-scrip 
as much as was that which the Senator from Texas 
j)roposed. 

[January 29, 1847, after a speech in opposition from Mr. 
Benton, on the same subject, in which he contended that it 
would " expunge the land of revenue for half a dozen years ;" 
that " all the John Smiths, John Joneses, Billy Williamses — all 
the Blacks, Browns, Greys, Reds, Whites — all the Longs and 
Shorts — all the Youngs and Olds — all that interminable nomen- 
clature of common names — will become breeders of warrants" — ■ 
Mr. CoRWiN again spoke as follows:] 

He felt as much regTet as it was possible for the 
Senator from Missouri to feel, at the delay which 
has occurred under the present exigencies in the 
passage of this army bill — a delay occasioned by 
the various propositions to amend which had been 
presented by the Senator from Missouri himself, and 
other Senators ; and he regretted, also, that it was 
to be still further delayed by what the honorable 
Senator from Missouri himself had very happily 
denominated "an obstinate and persevering opi:)0- 
sition" to the amendment now under considera- 
tion, which, it would be recollected, had once passed 
by a majority which he believed had not been 



BOUNTY LANDS TO SOLDIEES. 315 

accorded to any other feature of the bill. He had 
to regret, for one, that it was not in his power, not 
being consistent with his sense of duty, to accede to 
the request made by the honorable Senator from 
Missouri yesterday ; and he was sure that honorable 
Senatoi was not inclined at all to deny to him, or to 
any other Senator upon that floor, the same right to 
form an opinion upon this important subject as he 
claimed for himself. As it was sincerely not his 
wish to procrastinate a vote which it was desirable 
should be speedily taken upon this bill, he desired 
merely to occupy a few moments in replying to what 
had been said by the honorable Senator fi'om Mis- 
souri. And first, he would premise that although 
everything which had been presented to them this 
morning by the Senator from Missouri, and every- 
thing that might be legitimately urged in reply to 
the arguments of the Senator from Missouri, had 
already been very fully presented, and he doubted 
not very fully considered by every Senator upon that 
floor; yet, having been the means (by what might 
almost be termed an accident, it was true) of present- 
ing this amendment, and having heard the terms in 
which it had been denounced, he supj)osed that it 
would be deemed proper for him to occupy a few 
moments with some observations before taking the 
final vote upon the question now to be determined. 
There had been some things revealed in this inci- 
dental discussion in reference to the war, and to the 
trooj)s which had been so freely and fully spoken 
of, and in very laudatory terms, on all sides of the 



316 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

chamber, which it was very difficult to reconcile with 
what was understood to be the opinion of gentlemen 
on all sides. 

The arguments of the Senator from Missouri, as 
he understood them, rested upon two grounds ex- 
clusively. The Senator contended, in the first place, 
that the bounty land offered to the soldier was not 
necessary to procure the services of the soldier. 
This was as clearly an objection to any bill that 
could be presented on this subject as it was to this. 
The Senator contended, and presented it to them as 
an argument against the passage of this amendment, 
that it was now a matter of contention between the 
patriotic citizens of this country, who wished to serve 
in this extraordinary war, as to who among them 
should be accepted, without any reference whatever 
to this bounty. If this was so, and if there was no 
justice in voting the bounty, or necessity for voting 
it, then let the vote be taken upon the question, 
without any further controversy. 

If the Senator from Missouri meant to say that 
men could be enlisted into the service for their 
monthly pay alone ; if he meant to declare — and he 
knew no man whose opinions upon this subject were 
entitled to greater weight — if he meant to declare 
that it was squandering the public property to give 
them lands in return for the lives of their soldiers, 
in return for the blood to be shed in this foreign war, 
let the proposition be brought forward in a distinct 
and separate form, and he would be as ready to vote 
upon it as he was when attached to this bill. Pie 



BOimrY LANDS TO SQLDIEES, 317 

had unclerstoocl, whether the project of giving bounty 
land originated with politicians or private individuals, 
that it was the intention of Congress — an intention 
which had been expressed in both Houses — that the 
soldier who served in this war should have bounty 
land as a part of his compensation for those services 
which, it was admitted on all hands, eminently entitled 
him to some compensation. If this was so, what 
became of the argument of the Senator from Mis- 
souri, that it was giving away eight millions of acres 
of the public lands, of the value of twelve millions 
of dollars, at the minimum price of those lands, for 
nothing ? 

If it be true (continued Mr. C.) that the gallant 
men who are willing to fight our battles in Mexico 
or elsewhere — for God knows where that roving 
army of yours will stop — if it be true that the whole 
population of this country capable of bearing arms 
are ready to precipitate themselves into this war in 
the enemy's country^ and that without price, without 
reward, or the hope of reward, where is the necessity 
for increasing their monthly pay, as is proposed by 
the bill now on your table? Sir, shall we drive a 
Jew's bargain with our soldiers? Shall we give a 
definite value for their patriotism ? Shall we count 
every groan ? Shall w^e give value for every drop of 
blood ? Shall we pay so much for a soldier's life ? 
so much as a compensation to the women and chil- 
dren who have been made widows and orphans by 
the w^ar? Shall we give them an estimated sum 
as value for their loss ? But I do not suppose that 



318 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIIN". 

any argument such as this could very readily find a 
lodgment in the head or the heart of any Senator 
here ; nor do I understand that the Senator from 
Missouri wishes anything of this sort. He wishes 
the Senate to pause, and lock the door against frauds, 
while granting a liberal compensation to the soldier. 
Now, let us look at this argument a little in detail. 
How will it be elaborated into a fact ? 

As he had understood the Senate to determine 
upon giving these bounty lands in some form or 
other, and as he understood they Avere for giving 
the eight millions in the form which he proposed in 
his amendment, to be actually settled and held by 
the soldier who performed the service, or by some 
representative of the soldier, he would ask, in a pecu- 
niary point of view to the Government itself, if this 
land was to be considered revenue and property 
which the Government had a right to use, by giving 
it either in the form of money or in the form of boun- 
ties to soldiers entering the war, where was the dif- 
ference, as far as the Government was concerned, 
whether that eight millions of acres was given in 
one form or in the other ? The argument, as far as 
it rested upon the fact of giving away these lands, it 
seemed to him the Senator had not well considered. 
The main part of the Senator's opposition rested 
upon his desire to protect the soldier, in the first 
place, from the frauds which might be perpetrated 
upon him, and, in the next place, to stay the march 
of that moral pestilence, of those villainies which 
would be practiced upon the soldier if this bill should 



BOUNTY LAXDS TO SOLDIERS. 319 

pass. To this view of the question he was inclined 
to attach a considerable degree of importance. He 
could see no ditference between allowing the soldier 
who discharged his duty in the public service to be 
paid in land, or in allowing him to be paid in money. 
If it were considered that the valor and courage of 
the soldier entitled him to a certain amount of com- 
pensation, it might be a proper subject to consider 
whether that amount should be greater or less, but 
he could see no difference at all between giving him 
land or money — none ; none to the Government, un- 
questionably ; none whatever in any scheme of finance 
which might be j)resented for the prosecution of this 
war. If, therefore, it were desirable that Congress 
should give to the soldier a certain amount of com- 
pensation, it could just as well be given in the form 
of monthly pay as in a grant of land. He could see 
no difference between granting land, from which 
the resources of the Government were partly to be 
derived, and creating a debt, which the Senator from 
Missouri said must be paid by the next generation, 
and voting for a loan of twenty-three millions, which 
must be redeemed at the time specified. Gentlemen 
did not seem to have their financial apprehensions 
aroused at all when it was proposed to borrow 
twenty-three millions of dollars, for which, like every 
other sum borrowed which they were unable to pay, 
they would have to give their note. There was no 
tremulous apprehension about borrowing money. But 
these were considerations which should have been 
thought of long before they entered upon this unprofit- 



320 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

able war. Borrowing money was one of the curses 
attending upon all wars. Debt was one of the curses 
which war necessarily involved — debt to be entailed 
ujoon posterity, if the present generation were not 
able to discharge it. It could not have escaped the 
apprehensions of any gentleman who held a seat 
upon that floor, on the day when their army passed 
the Nueces, or on the day when it was said Congress 
sanctioned the passage of the army beyond the boun- 
dary of the United States — it could not have escaped 
their apprehension that not merely twelve millions 
of dollars, but hundreds of millions would have to 
be expended upon the war — a war to be carried on 
between this country and a sister republic, which 
they had undertaken to subjugate by their arms. 
The honorable Senator from Missouri, and every 
Senator, must be aware that this would be the con- 
sequence of their conduct. He had been somewhat 
surprised, he confessed, at the minute details given 
of the schemes of fraud which the Senator from 
Missouri had asserted would be practiced, and he 
doubted not such reports had reached his ears ; but 
he was pained to hear such schemes of peculation 
and fraud connected with the names of certain offi- 
cers of the Government. That companies of scoun- 
drels would be formed all over the country, as the 
Senator said, to endeavor to despoil the soldier of his 
hard-earned bounty, he had no doubt. It was one of 
the inevitable consequences of all wars ; it was one 
of the curses which belonged to a state of war. It 
had been the case, as the Senator from Missouri had 



BOUNTY LAXDS TO SOLDIERS. 321 

said, and he read a statement of Mr. Jefferson to 
prove, after the close of the Revokitionary war. It 
was a well-known fact, that the men who had passed 
through the tires of the struggle, were found endeav- 
oring to defraud each other out of what they had 
received as" a compensation for their services. It had 
ever been so, and would be so to all time, as long as 
human nature was such as to induce men to go to 
war at all. So long as men could find no better 
mode of settling national controversies than by going 
to war ; of marching armies against each other in 
battle array, instead of following the dictates of 
humanity; instead of exercising the faculties with 
which Grod had endowed them, in avoiding the neces- 
sity of warfare, there would be scoundrels enough 
found to plunder and cheat one another. So long as 
national controversies were to be settled in the old 
barbarous mode, so long would such a disposition be 
found to exist. But he was surprised to hear from 
the Senator from Missouri that the very officers of 
the Government, whose aj)pointments the Senate 
was called upon to sanction, and commissioned by 
the President to carry on the war, which was em- 
phatically his war, he was surprised to hear that 
men in this position would be found so reckless, so 
lost to the dictates of honor and of conscience, as to 
practice frauds of this description. Could this be 
true ? Could it be that those who were daily asso- 
ciated with the soldiers, witnessing their sufferings 
and hearing the groans of the dying, would be guilty 
of robbing the soldier of the bounty which his 
21 



322 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

country had bestowed ? He asked the Senator, was 
this the condition in which this Republic was now 
placed? Were such the official instrumentalities to 
be sent abroad to execute their duties in the service 
of the Government upon the field of battle? His 
knowledge of human nature would hardly allow him 
to suppose it had been sunk to that depth of degra- 
dation and of infamy. Such a supposition con- 
templated the existence of a class of society more 
degraded than he was willing to suppose any man 
who had received his commission from the Govern- 
ment could be. They might, 23erhaj)S, find in the 
dens and hells of cities men who would come out 
from their hiding-places, when they knew that eight 
millions of acres of land had been put into the mar- 
ket for the benefit of those who served, but he did 
not think that men who accompanied the soldier at 
his last gasp would deliberately plan such schemes 
of fraud. He said he did not believe it was compe- 
tent for any intelligent man to frame a law, or devise 
a plan which would not be subject to the objections 
which had been raised by the Senator from Missouri. 
Men ever would be subject to impositions, but he did 
not believe these men would be more subject to impo- 
sitions than any other class of men. 

Mr. Corwin said the Senator from Pennsylvania 
had told them that if they would pass this bill, there 
were five companies now ready to volunteer, and to 
take the field from that State, and that they consisted 
of some of the best men of that State. That was a 
pretty good certificate of character; and were such 



BOUNTY LANDS TO SOLDIEES. 323 

men likely to give up all rights belonging to them to 
bodies of scoundrels? Did the Senator from Missouri 
mean to say that the young men who volunteer to 
serve their country are the sort of men toward whom 
the Government could exercise neither the functions 
of justice nor liberality without having the bounty 
of the Grovernment abused? Were they men of such 
dissolute habits that they were incapable of taking 
care of the propert}^ they earned, and that the Grov- 
ernment must therefore assume tow^ard the soldiers 
of our army the relation which some of the States 
assumed under the laws toward confirmed drunkards, 
and appoint them guardians ? What became of the 
training and discipline of wdiich they had heard so 
much as belonging to the service of the country? 
"VVTiat became of the moral teaching of the chaplains, 
for whose appointment they had heard so much? 
Was it true, in short, that twenty thousand regular 
soldiers were to serve during this war, and go through 
a moral training there, and that they would come 
out of it nothing but examj^les of vileness, ignorance, 
and profligacy? Was it true that the men who 
volunteer to fight this iniquitous war were the men 
described by the Senator from Missouri, not able to 
exercise the necessary functions of freemen, and men 
of full age? He would not undertake to put his 
opinion on this subject against the opinion of the 
Senator from Missouri — he would not lightly ques- 
tion the statement of the Senator from South Car- 
olina [Mr. Butler], who said yesterday that none 
were fit to fight in this war but those who were 



324 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

ready to sacrifice their own will to the absolute mas- 
ierj of others ; but if these things were true, it would 
become them to pause and consider whether it was 
not best to put an end to this horrible war. If it 
were true that in enlisting twenty thousand soldiers 
they made twenty thousand slaves out of twenty 
thousand freemen, he thought it would be poor com- 
pensation, both for the generation that now is and for 
that which is to come after us, in the pompous phrase 
of the day, at such a cost to vindicate the honor of 
the country and the glory of its flag. But he could 
not think that the representations of the Senator 
from Missouri were all true. He could not believe 
this nation would plunge into a war which was to be 
so iiernicious in its consequences. 

The Senator from Missouri proposed to protect the 
soldier from these frauds by making the bounty 
inalienable for seven years. This was presuming 
that those who, as the Senator from Missouri 
eloquently described it, escaped the embrace of the 
battle-storm, and avoided a grave upon the tops of 
the Cordilleras, were not capable of controlling the 
bounty which the Government bestowed upon them, 
and that Congress must, therefore, constitute itself 
their guardian. He was of opinion, that if they put 
the matter upon this footing, and said to the soldier, 
that at the end of the war he should emigrate to the 
far West and settle upon his land, or else be debarred 
from the enjoyment of his bounty for seven years, it 
would have the effect of deterring men from entering 
the army. It would hardly be necessary, he be- 



BOUNTY LANDS TO SOLDIERS. d25 

lieved, to pass an act to prevent a Senator from 
making a contract respecting his traveling allowance 
and per diem, of placing any lien upon it for a certain 
length of time, lest the money might fall into the hands 
of speculators, who were hovering in clouds around 
the Caj^itoi, darkening the air with their numbers. 
That would be a strange law ; but he thought it would 
be quite as reasonable as the restriction proposed by 
the Senator to be placed upon these bounty lands. 

After some further remarks, Mr. Corwin concluded 
by saying, that he thought it would not be very 
becoming in the Senate to hesitate to grant, out of 
800,000,000 acres of the public lands, the small pit- 
tance of 8,000,000 to the soldiers as compensation for 
their services. They had already passed a bill 
giving 5,000,000 acres to those who choose to peace- 
fully settle in Oregon. If a Southern gentleman, 
with his black servant, went to Oregon, that servant 
would be entitled, by his mere residence there, to 
avail himself of this bounty. While looking out 
across the broad Pacific, and contemplating the time 
when the descendants of Japhet should subjugate the 
descendants of Shem, here was a man fi'om a state 
of servitude becoming a free man, and claiming his 
half section of land, which had been granted by the 
bounty of this Government. While their maw was 
capacious enough to swallow these fiive millions in 
reference to Oregon, they were gurgling and chok- 
ing at eight millions to be granted as a reward for 
the valor and the j^atriotism of those who periled 
their lives in their country's service. 



ON THE MEXICAN WAR. 

[In the Senate of the United States, February 11th, 1847, 
the bill making further appropriations to bring the existing War 
with Mexico to a speedy and honorable conclusion, being under 
consideration, Mr. CoRWiN said:] 

Me. President : 

I am not now about to perform the useless task of 
surveying the whole field of debate occupied in this 
discussion. It has been carefully reaped, and by 
vigilant and strong hands ; and yet, Mr. President, 
there is a part of that field which j^romises to reward 
a careful gleaner with a valuable sheaf or two, which 
deserves to be bound up before the wdiole harvest is 
gathered. And still this so tempting prospect could 
not have allured me into this debate, had that motive 
not been strengthened by another, somew^hat personal 
to myself, and still more interesting to those I repre- 
sent. Anxious as I know all are to act, rather than 
debate, I am compelled, for the reasons I have as- 
signed, to solicit the attention of the Senate. I do 
this chiefly that I may discharge the humble duty 
of giving to the Senate, and through this medium to 
ni}' constituents, the motives and reasons which have 
impelled me to occupy a position always undesirable, 
but, in times like the present, painfully embarrassing. 

I have been compelled, from convictions of duty 
which I could not disregard, to differ not merely 
(326) 



ON THE MEXICAN WAR. 327 

with those on the other side of the chamber, with 
whom I seldom agree, but also to separate, on one 
or two important questions, from a majority of my 
friends on this side — those who compose here that 
Whig party, of which, I suppose, I may yet call 
myself a member. 

Diversity of opinion, on most subjects affecting 
human affairs, is to be expected. Unassisted mind, 
in its best estate, has not yet attained to uniformity, 
much less to absolute certainty, in matters belonging 
to the dominion of speculative reason. This is pecu- 
liarly and emphatically true where we endeavor to 
deduce from the present,- results, the accomplishment 
of which reach far into the future, and will only 
clearly develop themselves in the progress of time. 
From the present state of the human mind, this is a 
law of intellect quite as strong as necessity ; and yet, 
after every reasonable allowance for the radical dif- 
ference in intellectual structure, culture, habits of 
thought, and the application of thought to things, 
the singularly opposite avowals made by the two 
Senators on the other side of the chamber (I mean 
the Senator from South Carolina, Mr. Calhoun, and 
the Senator from Michigan, Mr. Cass), must have 
struck all who heard them as a curious and mournful 
example of the truth of w^hich I have spoken. The 
Senator from Michigan (Mr. Cass), in contemplating 
the present aspects and probable future course of our 
public affairs, declared that he saw nothing to alarm 
the fears or depress the hopes of the patriot. To 
his serene, and, as I fear, too apathetic mind, all is 



328 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

calm ; the sentinel might sleep securely on his watch- 
tower. The ship of State seems to him to expand 
her sails under a clear sky, and move on, with pros- 
perous gales, upon a smooth sea. He admonishes 
all not to anticipate evil to come, but to fold their 
hands and close their eyes in quietude, ever mindful 
of the consolatory text, "sufficient unto the day is 
the evil thereof." But the Senator from South Caro- 
lina (Mr. Calhoun), summoning fi'om the depths of 
his thoughtful and powerful mind all its energies, 
and looking abroad on the present condition of the 
republic, is pained with fearful apprehension, doubt, 
distrust, and dismay. To his vision, made strong 
by a long life of careful observation, made keen by 
a comprehensive view of past history, the sky seems 
overcast with impending storms, and the dark future 
is shrouded in impenetrable gloom. When two such 
minds thus differ, those less familiar with great sub- 
jects affecting the happiness of nations may well 
pause, before they rush to a conclusion on this, a 
subject which, in all its bearings, immediate and 
remote, affects certainhj the present prosperity, and 
])rohaUy the liberty, of two republics, embracing 
together nearly thirty millions of people. Mr. Pre- 
sident, it is a fearful responsibility we have assumed ; 
engaged in flagrant, desolating war with a neighbor- 
ing republic, to us thirty millions of God's creatures 
look up for that moderated wisdom which, if possible, 
may stay the march of misery, and restore to them, 
if it may be so, mutual feelings of good-will, with all 
the best blessings of peace. 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 329 

I sincerely wish it were in my power to cherish 
those phicid convictions of security which have set- 
tled upon the mind of the Senator from Michigan. 
So far from this, I have been, in common with the 
Senator from South Carolina, oppressed with melan- 
choly forebodings of evils to come, and not unfre- 
quently by a conviction that each step we take in 
this unjust war, may be the last in our career ; that 
each chapter we write in Mexican blood, may close 
the volume of our history as a free peoj^le. Sir, I 
am the less inclined to listen to the siren song the 
Senator from Michigan sings to his own soul, because 
I have heard its notes before. I know the country 
is at this moment suffering from the fatal apathy 
into which it was lulled a few years ago. Every one 
must recall to his mind, with pleasing regret, the 
happy condition of the country in 1843, when that 
other question, the prelude to this, the annexation 
of Texas, w^as agitated here ; we remember how it 
attracted the attention of the whole Union; we re- 
member that the two great leaders of the two great 
parties, agreeing in scarcely any other opinion, were 
agreed in that. They both predicted that if Texas 
were annexed, war with Mexico w^ould be the proba- 
ble result. We were told then by others, as now 
by the Senator from Michigan, that all was well — all 
was calm; that Mexico would not fight, or if she 
would, she was too weak to wage the struggle with 
any eifect upon us. The sentinel was then told to 
sleep upon his watch-tower ; "sufficient unto the day 
is the evil thereof," was sung to us then in notes as 



330 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

soft and sweet as now. Mr. President, "the day" 
has come, and with it has come war, the most direful 
curse wherewith it has pleased God to afflict a sinful 
world. Such have been the fatal effects of lulling 
into apathy the public mind, on a subject which 
agitated it, as well it might, to its profoundest 
dej^ths. 

I repeat, sir, the day has come, as was then pre- 
dicted, and the evil j^redicted has come with it. We 
are here, sir, now, not as then, at peace with all the 
world ; not now, as then, with laws that brought into 
your treasury everything adequate to its wants ; not 
now, as then, free from debt, and the apprehension 
of debt and taxation, its necessary consequence. But 
we are here with a treasury that is beggared ; that 
lifts up its imploring hands to the monopolists and 
'Capitalists of the country; that sends out its notes 
•lid "promises to pay" into every mart and every 
•»iarket in the world, begging for a pittance from 
every hand to help to swell the amount now neces- 
sary to extricate us from a war, inevitable, as it now 
seems it was, from that very act which was adopted 
under such flattering promises two years ago. Mr. 
President, it is no purpose of mine to arraign the 
conduct of the United States upon that occasion ; it 
is no purpose of mine to treat this young and newly- 
adopted sister — the State of Texas — as an alien or 
stranger in this family of republics. I allude to this 
only to show how little reliance is to be placed upon 
those favorable anticipations in which gentlemen in- 
dulge with regard to consequences Avhieh may flow 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 331 

from measures to which they are strongly wedded, 
either by feeling or party attachment. 

Is there nothing else in our history of even the 
past year to justify the Senator from South Carolina 
in the pregnant declaration, that in the whole period 
of his public life, comprehending the most eventful 
in the history of the Republic, there had never been 
a time when so much danger was threatened to the 
interests, happiness, and liberties of the people. Sir, 
if any one could sit down, free from the excitements 
and biases which belong to public affairs — could such 
a one betake himself to those sequestered solitudes, 
\\'liere thoughtful men extract the philosophy of his- 
tory from its facts, I am quite sure no song of "all 's 
well" would be heard from his retired cell. No, sir, 
looking at the events of the last twelve months, and 
forming his judgment of these by the suggestions 
which history teaches, and which she alone can teach, 
he would record another of those sad lessons which, 
though often taught, are, I fear, forever to be disre- 
garded. He would speak of a Republic, boasting 
that its rights were secured, and the restricted 
powers of its functionaries bound up in the chains 
of a written Constitution ; he would record on his 
page, also, that such a people, in the wantonness of 
strength or the fancied security of the moment, had 
torn that w^ritten Constitution to pieces, scattered its 
fragments to the winds, and surrendered themselves 
to the usurped authority of ONE MAN. 

He would find written in that Constitution, Con- 
gress shall have power to declare war ; he would find 



332 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

everywhere, in that okl charter, proofs clear and 
strong, that they who framed it intended that Con- 
gress, composed of two Houses, the representatives 
of the States, and the people, should (if any were pre- 
eminent) be the controlling power. He would iind 
there a President designated ; wdiose general and 
almost exclusive duty it is to execute^ not to make the 
law. Turning from this to the history of the last 
ten months, he would find that the President alone, 
without the advice or consent of Congress, had, by a 
bold usurpation, made war on a neighboring repub- 
lic ; and what is quite as much to be deplored, that 
Congress, whose high powers were thus set at naught 
and defied, had, with ready and tame submission, 
yielded to the usurper the wealth and power of the 
nation to execute his will, as if to swell his iniquitous 
triumph over the very Constitution which he and 
they had alike sworn- to support. 

If any one should inquire for the cause of a war in 

this country, where should he resort for an ansAver ? 

Surely to the journals of both Houses of Congress, 

since Congress alone has powder to declare war ; yet 

although we have been engaged in war for the last 

ten months, a war wdiich has tasked all the fiscal 

resources of the country to carry it forward, you shall 

search the records and the archives of both Houses 

of Congress in vain for any detail of its causes, any 

/^resolve of Congress that war shall be waged. How 

/ is it, then, that a peaceful and peace-loving people, 

I happy beyond the coitimon lot of man, busy in every 

I laudable pursuit of life, have been forced to turn 



ox THE MEXICAN WAE. 333 

suddenly from these and plunge into the misery, the \ 
vice, and crime which ever have been, and ever shall ] 
be, the attendant scourges of war? The answer can 
only be, it was by the act and will of the President 
alone, and not by the act or will of Congress, the war- 
making department of the Grovernment. 

Mr. President, was it not due to ourselves, to the 
lofty character for peace as well as probity which we 
profess to be ours, and which till recently we might 
justly claim — ^^vas it not due to the civilization of the 
age, that we, the representatives of the States and 
the people, should have set forth the causes which 
might impel us to invoke the fatal arbitrament of 
war, before we madly rushed upon it? Even the 
Senator from South Carolina, attached as he has 
been b}^ party ties to the President, and therefore, 
as we may suppose, acquainted with /u's motives 
for 7m war with Mexico, was comjoelled to say the 
other day in debate, that, up to that hour, the causes 
of this war w^ere left to conjecture. The reason of 
this singular anomaly, sir, is to be found in the fact 
that the President, and not Congress, declared and 
commenced this war. How is this, Mr. President ? 
How is it that we have so disappointed the intentions 
of our fathers, and the hopes of all the friends of 
written Constitutions? When the makers of that 
Constitution assigned to Congress alone, the most 
delicate and important power — to declare war — a 
power more intimately affecting the interests, imme- 
diate and remote, of the people, than any which a 
government is ever called on to exert — when they 



334 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

withheld this great prerogative from the Executive 
and confided it to Congress alone, they but consulted 
in this, as in every other work of their hands, the 
.gathered wisdom of all preceding times. Whether 
they looked to the stern desj)otisms of the ancient 
A siatic world, or the military yoke of imperial Rome, 
or the feudal institutions of the middle ages, or the 
more modern monarchies of Europe, in each and all 
of these, where the power to wage war was held by 
one or by a few, it had been used to sacrifice, not to 
protect the many. The caprice or ambition of the 
tyrant, had always been the cause of bloody and 
wasting war, while the subject millions had been 
treated by their remorseless masters, only as " tools 
in the hands of him who knew how to use them." 
They therefore declared, that this fearful power 
should be confided to those who represent the peoj^le, 
and those who here in the Senate represent the sov- 
ereign States of the Republic. After securing this 
power to Congress, they thought it safe to give the 
command of the armies in peace and war to the 
President. We shall see hereafter, how by an abuse 
of his power as commander-in-chief, the President 
has drawn to himself that of declaring war, or com- 
mencing hostilities with a people with whom we were 
on terms of peace, which is substantially the same. 

The men of former times took very good care that 
your standing army should be exceedingly small, 
and they who had the most lively apprehensions of 
investing in one man the power to command the 
army, always inculcated upon the minds of the 



ox THE MEXICAX WAR. 335 

people, the necessity of keeping that army within 
limits, just as small as the necessity of the external 
relations of the country would possibly admit. It 
has happened, Mr. President, that Avhen a little dis- 
turbance on your Indian frontier took place. Congress 
was invoked for an increase of your military force. 
Gentlemen came here who had seen ^^artial service 
in the armies of the United States. They tell you 
that the militia of the country is not to be relied 
upon — that it is only in the regular army of the 
United States, that you are to find men competent 
to fight the battles of the country, and from time to 
time when that necessity has seemed to arise, forget- 
ting this old doctrine, that a large standing army 
in time of peace was always dangerous to human 
liberty, we have increased that army from six thou- 
sand up to about sixteen thousand men. Mr. Presi- 
dent, the other day, we gave ten regiments more : 
and for not giving it within the quick time demanded 
by our master, the commander-in-chief, some minion, 
I know not who, for I have not looked into this mat- 
ter until this morning, feeding upon the fly-blown 
remnants that fall from the Executive shambles and 
lie putrefying there, has denounced us as Mexicans, 
and called the American Republic to take notice, 
that there was in the Senate, a body of men charge- 
able with incivism — Mexicans in heart — traitors t<> 
the United States. 

I trust, Mr. President, that our master will be 
appeased by the facility with which, immediately 
after that rebuke of his minion, the Senate acted 



336 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWHS". 

upon the bill and gave liim the army which he 
required. I trust that he will now forget that law 
which, as commander-in-chief of the army of the 
United States and President of this great North 
American Republic for the time being, he promul- 
gated to us in the rhessage, and those commands 
^vhich he was pleased to deliver at the opening of 
this session to his faithful and humble servitors in 
both branches of the American Congress, admonish- 
ing us that we would be. considered as giving " aid 
and comfort" to his enemy — not ours! — Ms — if one 
word should be said unfavorable to the motives 
which have brought the royal will to the conclusion 
that he would precipitate this Republic into a war 
with Mexico ! I trust his Majesty, in consideration 
of our faithful services in augmenting the forces of 
the Republic agreeably to the commands which we 
have received from the throne, will be induced to 
relax a little when he comes to execute that law of 
treason upon one at least so humble as myself ! I do 
remember, Mr. President — you will remember, Mr. 
President — your recollection of history will furnish 
you with a case which will, I think, operate in my 
favor in a question of that sort. 

Some time in the history of the royal Tudors in 
England, when a poor Englishman, for diifering from 
His Majesty, or Her Majesty, on some subject — it 
might be religious faith — was condemned to be 
hanged and quartered and emboweled, out of special 
grace, in a particular case where penitence was ex- 
pressed, the hangman was admonished to give the 



ox THE MEXICAN WAE. 337 

culprit time to choke before he began to chop up his 
limbs and take out his bowels ! 

Now, Mr. President, I have already stated that I 
do not intend to occupy the Senate with a discussion 
of those varieties of topics which naturally enforce 
themselves upon my attention in considering this 
subject. It must have occurred to everybody how 
utterly impotent the Congress of the United States 
now is for any purpose whatever, but that of yielding 
to the President every demand which he makes for 
men and money, unless they assume that only posi- 
tion which is left — that which, in the history of other 
countries, in times favorable to human liberty, has 
been so often resorted to as a check upon arbitrary 
power — withholding money, refusing to grant the 
services of men when demanded for purposes which 
are not deemed to be proper. 

When I review the doctrines of the majority here, 
and consider their application to the existing war, I 
confess I am at a loss to determine whether the world 
is to consider our conduct as a ridiculous farce, or be 
lost in amazement at such absurdity in a people call- 
ing themselves free. The President, without asking 
the consent of Congress, involves us in war, and the 
majority here, without reference to the justice or 
necessity of the war, call upon us to grant men and 
mone}^ at the pleasure of the President, who they 
say, is charged with the duty of carrying on the war 
and responsible for its result. If we grant the means 
thus demanded, the President can carry forward this 
22 



338 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN". 

war for any end, or from any motive, witlioiit limit 
of time or place. 

With these doctrines for our guide, I will thank 
any Senator to furnish me with any means of escap- 
ing from the prosecution of this or any other war, 
for a hundred years to come, if it please the Presi- 
dent who shall be, to continue it so long. Tell me, 
ye who contend that being in war, duty demands of 
Congress for its prosecution, all the money and every 
able-bodied man in America to carr}^ it on if need 
be, who also contend that it is the right of the Pres- 
ident, without the control of Congress, to march your 
embodied hosts to Monterey, to Yucatan, to Mexico, 
to Panama, to China, and that under penalty of death 
to the officer who disobeys him — tell me, I demand 
it of you, tell me, tell the American people, tell the 
nations of Christendom, what is the difference be- 
tween your American democracy and the most 
odious, most hateful despotism, that a merciful Grod 
has ever allowed a nation to be afflicted with since 
government on earth began? You may call this free 
government, but it is such freedom, and no other, as 
of old was established at Babylon, at Susa, at Bac- 
triana, or Persepolis. Its parallel is scarcely to be 
found when thus falsely understood, in any even the 
worst forms of civil polity in modern times. Sir, it 
is not so, such is not your Constitution, it is some- 
thing else, something other and better than this. 

I have looked at this subject with a painful en- 
deavor to come to the conclusion, if possible, that it 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 339 

was my duty, as a Senator of the United States, 
finding the country in war, to "fight it out," as we 
say in the common and popuhir phrase of the times, 
to a just and honorable peace! I coukl very easily 
concede that to be my duty if I found my country 
engaged in a just war — in a war necessary even to 
protect that fancied honor of which you talk so much. 
I then should have some apology in the judgment 
of my country, in the determination of my conscience, 
and in that appeal which you, and I, and all of us 
must soon be required to make before a tribunal, 
where this vaunted honor of the Republic, I fear me, 
will gain but little credit as a defense to any act we 
may perform here in the Senate of the United States. 
But when I am asked to say whether I will prose- 
cute a war, I can not answer that question, yea or 
nay, until I have determined whether that was a 
necessarij war; and I can not determine whether it 
was necessary until I know how it was that my 
country was involved in it. And it is to that par- 
ticular point, ]Mr. President — without reading docu- 
ments, but referring to a few facts which I understand 
ftot to be denied on either side of this chamber — ^that 
I wish to direct the attention of the American Senate, 
and so far as may be, that of any of the noble and 
honest-hearted constituents whom I represent here. 
I know, Mr. President, the responsibility which I 
assume in undertaking to determine that the Presi- 
dent of the United States has done a great wrong to 
the country, whose honor and whose interest he was 
required to protect. I know the denunciations which 



340 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

await every one who shall dare to put himself in 
opposition to that high power — that idol god — which 
the people of this country have made to themselves 
and called a President. 

But it is my very humility which makes me bold. 
I know, sir, that he who was told in former time how 
to govern a turbulent people, was advised to cut off 
the tallest heads. Mine will esca2:)e! Still, holding 
a seat here, Mr. President, and finding it written in 
the Constitution of my country that I had the power 
to grant to the President at his bidding, or not, as I 
pleased, men and money, I did conceive that it 
became my duty to ascertain whether the President's 
request was a reasonable one — whether the President 
wanted these men and this money for a proper and 
laudable purj^ose or not ; and with these old-fashioned 
ideas — quite as unpopular, I fear, with some on this 
side of the Chamber as we find them to be on the 
other — I set myself to this painful investigation. I 
found not quite enough along with me to have saved 
the unrighteous city of old. 

There were not five of us, but only three! And 
when these votes were called, and I was compelled 
to separate myself from almost all around me, I 
could have cried as did the man of XJz in his afilic- 
tion in the elder time — "What time my friends wax 
warm they vanish, when it is hot they are consumed 
out of their places!" 

I could not leave the position in which it had 
pleased the State of Ohio to place me, and I returned 
again and again to the original and primary and 



ox THE MEXICAN WAE. 341 

important inquiry — how is it that my country is 
involved in this war? I looked to the President's 
account of it, and he tells me it was a war for the 
defense of the territory of the United States. I 
found it written in that message, Mr. President, that 
this war was not sought nor forced upon Mexico by 
the j)eoj)le of the United States. I shall make no 
question of history or the truth of history with my 
master, the commander-in-chief, upon that particular 
proposition. On the contrary, I could verify every 
word that he thus utters. Sir, I know that the ][)eople 
of the United States neither sought nor forced Mexico 
into this war, and yet I know that the President of 
the United States, with the command of your stand- 
ing army, did seek that war, and that he forced 
war upon Mexico. I am not about to afflict the 
Senate with a detail of testimony on that point. I 
will simply state facts which few, I trust, will be 
found to deny. 

One of the facts, Mr. President, is this : that in 
the year of grace, 1836, the battle of San Jacinto 
was fought. Does anybody deny that? No one 
here will doubt that fact. The result of that battle 
was that a certain district of countr}^, calling itself 
Texas, declared itself a free and independent re- 
public. I hope the Senate will pardon me for 
uttering a thought or two, which strikes me just now 
while I see the Senator from Texas, the leader of the 
men who achieved that victory, before me. I wish 
to say a word or two about the great glory, the his- 
torical renown, that is to come to the people of the 



342 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

United States by the victories wliieli we shall obtain 
over the arms and forces of the Republic of Mexico. 
I suppose, Mr. President, like all other boys, in my 
early youth, when I had an opportunity of looking 
at a book called histor}^, those which spoke of bloody 
battles and desolating wars were most likely to 
attract my attention ; and with very limited means 
of ascertaining that portion of the history of the 
human race, it nevertheless has impressed itself very 
vividly upon my mind that there have been great 
wars, and, as the old maxim has it, "many brave 
men before Agamemnon." 

Sir, the world's annals show very many ferocious 
sieges, and battles, and onslaughts, before San Jacinto, 
Palo Alto, or Monterey. . Generals of bloody renown 
have frightened the nations before the revolt of Texas, 
or our invasion of Mexico ; and I suppose we Ameri- 
cans might properly claim some share in this martial 
reputation, since it was won by our own kindred, 
men clearl}^ descended from Noah, the great "pro- 
positus" of our family, with whom we all claim a 
very endearing relationship. But I confess, I have 
been somewhat surprised of late, that men, read in 
the history of man, who knew that war has been his 
trade for six thousand years (pronij^ted, I imagine, 
by those "noble instincts" spoken of by the Senator 
from Michigan), who knew that the first man born 
of woman was a hero of the first magnitude, that he 
met his shepherd brother in deadly coniiict, and 
most heroically beat out his brains with a club — I 
say, sir, I am somewhat puzzled when I hear those 



ON THE MEXICAN WAR. 343 

wlio knew all tliese things well, nevertheless shout- 
ing p?eans of glory to the American name, for the 
few deeds of death which our noble little army in 
Mexico has as yet been able to achieve. 

But, sir, let me recur again to the battle of San' 
Jacinto. The Senator from Texas (Gen. Houston), 
»now in his seat, commanded there. His army con- 
sisted of about seven hundred and fifty men. These 
were collected from all parts of the United States, 
and from the population of Texas, then numbering 
about ten thousand souls. With this army, undis- 
ciplined, badly armed, and indiiferently furnished. 
in all respects, the Senator from Texas conquered a 
Mexican army of about 3,500 men ; took their com- 
mander, Santa Anna, then President of Mexico, 
prisoner, with the whole of his forces. Texas de- 
clared her independence, and alone maintained it 
against the power of Mexico for seven years, and 
since that time has been a State under the shield 
of our protection. It is against this same Mexico 
that twenty millions of Anglo-Saxon Americans send 
forth their armies. The great North American Re- 
public buckles on her armor, and her mighty bosom 
heaves with the ^''gaudia certamims,^^ as she marches 
under her eagle banners to encounter a foe, who, ten 
years ago, was whipped by an army of seven hundred 
and fifty undisciplined militia, and bereft of a terri- 
tory larger than the empire of France, which her 
conqueror held in her despite for seven years, and 
then quietly transferred her territory and power to 
you. Sir, if the joint armies of the United States 



344 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIIN". 

and Texas are to acquire renown by vanquisliing 
Mexico, what honors are too great to be denied to 
Texas for her victory over this Mexico ten years 
ago ? If, by vanquishing such a foe, you are to win 
renown in war, what laurels should you not wreathe 
around the brows of those who fought at San Jacinto, 
especially when history tells of the killed and wounded 
in the latter fight, she records that just three were 
killed in mortal combat, while two died of their 
wounds "when the battle was done!!!" Oh, Mr. 
President, does it indeed become this great Republic 
to cherish the heroic wish to measure arms with the 
long since conquered, distracted, anarchic, and miser- 
able Mexico ? 

Mr. President, I trust we shall abandon the idea, 
the heathen, barbarian notion, that our true national 
glory is to be won, or retained, by military prowess 
or skill in the art of destroying life. And, while I 
can not but lament, for the permanent and lasting 
renown of my country, that she should command 
the service of her children in what I must consider 
wanton, unprovoked, unnecessary, and therefore unjust 
war, I can yield to the brave soldier, whose trade is 
war, and whose duty is obedience, the highest meed 
of praise for his courage, his enterprise, and perpetual 
endurance of the fatigues and horrors of war. I 
know the gallant men who are engaged in fighting 
your battles possess personal bravery equal to any 
troops, in any land, anywhere engaged in the busi- 
ness of war. I do not believe we are less capable 
in the art of destruction than others, or less willing, 



ON THE MEXICAN WAR. 345 

on the slightest pretext, to unsheath the sword, and 
consider "revenge a virtue." I could wish, also, that 
your brave soldiers, while they bleed and die on the 
battle-field, might have (what in this war is impos- 
sible) the consolation to feel and know that their 
blood flowed in defense of a great right — that their 
lives were a meet sacrifice to an exalted principle. 

But, sir, I return to our relations wdth Mexico. 
Texas, I have shown, having won her independence, 
and torn from Mexico about one-fourth part of her 
territory, comes to the United States, sinks her 
national character into the less elevated, but more 
secure, position of one of the United States of 
America. The revolt of Texas, her successful war 
with Mexico, and the consequent loss of a valu- 
able province, all inured to the ultimate benefit of 
our Government and our country. While Mexico 
was w^eakened and humbled, we, in the same pro- 
portion, were strengthened and elevated. All this 
was done against the wish, the interest, and the 
earnest remonstrance of Mexico. 

Every one can feel, if he will examine himself for 
a moment, what must have been the mingled emo- 
tions of pride, humiliation, and bitter indignation, 
which raged in the bosoms of the Mexican people, 
when they saw one of their fairest provinces torn 
from them by a revolution, moved by a foreign 
people ; and that province, by our act and our con- 
sent, annexed to the already enormous expanse of 
our territory. It is idle, Mr. President, to suppose 
that the Mexican people would not feel as deeply for 



346 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the dismemberment and disgrace of their country as 
you would for the dismemberment of this Union of 
ours. Sir, there is not a race, nor tribe, nor people 
on the earth, who have an organized social or political 
existence, who have clung with more obstinate atfec- 
tion to every inch of soil they could call their own, 
than this very Spanish, this Mexican, this Indian race, 
in that country. So strong and deep is this senti- 
ment in the heart of that half-savage, half-civilized 
race, that it has become not merely an opinion, a 
principle, but with them an unreasoning fanaticism. 
So radically deep and strong has this idea rooted 
itself into the Mexican mind, that I learn recently 
it has been made a part of the new fundamental 
law, that not an inch of Mexican soil shall ever be 
alienated to a foreign power ; that her territory shall 
remain entire as long as her republic endures ; that, 
if one of her limbs be forcibly severed from her, 
death shall ensue, unless that limb shall be re-united 
to the parent trunk. With such a peoj^le, not like 
you, as you fondly, and I fear, vainly boast your- 
selves, a highly-civilized, reasoning, and philosophical 
race, but a people who upon the fierce barbarism of 
the old age have ingrafted the holy sentiments of 
patriotism of a later birth ; wdth just such a people, 
the pride of independence and the love of country 
combine to inflame and sublimate patriotic attach- 
ment into a feeling dearer than life — stronger than 
death. 

What were the sentiments of such a people toward 
us when they learned that, at the battle of San Jacinto, 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 347 

there were only seventy-five men of their own country, 
out of the seven hundred and fifty who conquered 
them on that day ;• and that every other man of that 
conquering army who fought that battle, and dismem- 
bered their republic of one-fourth part of its territory, 
had but recently gone there from this country, was 
fed by our people, and armed and equipped in the 
United States to do that very deed. 

I do not say that Mexico had a right to make war 
upon us, because our citizens chose to seek their for- 
tunes in the fields of Texas. I do not say she had a 
right to treat you as a belligerent power, because you 
permitted your citizens to march in battalions and 
regiments from your shores, for the avowed purpose 
of insurrectionary war in Texas — but I was not alone 
at the time in expressing my astonishment, that all 
this did not work an open rupture between the two 
Republics at that time. We all remember your 
proclamations of neutrality — ^^ve know that in defiance 
of these, your citizens armed themselves and engaged 
in the Texa.n revolt; and it is true that without such 
aid Texas would this day have been, as she then 
was, an integral portion of the Mexican republic. 
Sir, Mexicans knew this then, they knew it when, 
seven years after, you coolly took this province under 
your protection and made it yom' own. Do you 
wonder, therefore, after all this, that when Texas did 
thus forcibly pass away from them and come to us, 
that prejudice amounting to hate, resentment im- 
placable as revenge toward us, should seize and 



348 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

possess and madden the entire population of a 
country thus weakened, humbled, contemned? 

Mr, President, how would the fire of indignation 
have burned in every bosom here if the government 
of Canada, with the connivance of the Crown of 
England, had permitted its people to arm themselves, 
or it might be, had allowed its regiments of trained 
mercenary troops stationed there to invade New 
York, and excite her to revolt, telling them that the 
Crown of England was the natural and paternal ruler 
of any people desiring to be free and happy — that 
your Government was weak, factious, oppressive — 
that man withered under its baleful influence — that 
your stars and stripes were only emblems of degra- 
dation, and symbols of faction — that England's lion, 
rampant on his field of gold, was the appropriate 
emblem of power, and symbol of national glor}^ — 
and they succeeded in alienating the weak or wicked 
of your people from you ! — should we not then have 
waged exterminating war upon England, in every 
quarter of the globe, where her people were to be 
found? 

If, sir, I say, old mother England had sent her 
children forward to you with such a purpose and 
message as that, and had severed the State of JN'ew 
York from you, and then, for some difficulty about 
the boundary along between it and Pennsylvania 
and New Jersey, running up some little tide-creek 
here, and going oif a little degi-ee or two there, should 
have said, "We have a dispute about this boundary; 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 349 

we have some forty thousand reguhir troops planted 
upon the boundary, and I wish you to understand 
that I am very strong — that I have not only thirty 
millions of people upon the soil of Great Britain 
that own my sovereign sway, but away upon the 
other side of the globe, right under you, there the 
lion of England commands the obedience of a hundred 
and twenty millions more. It becomes you, strag- 
gling Democrats, here in this new world, to be a little 
careful how you treat me. You are not Celts exactly 
— nor are you quite Anglo Saxons; but you are a 
degenerate, an alien, a sort of bastard race. I have 
taken your JN'ew York; I will have your Massachu- 
setts." And all this is submitted to the American 
Senate, and we are gravely discussing what ought to 
be done. Would we be likely to ratify a treaty 
between New York and the Crown of England, per- 
mitting JN'ew York to become a part of the colonial 
possessions of England ? 

I should like to hear my colleague [Mr. Allen] 
S2:)eak to such a question as that. I should like to 
hear the voice of this Democracy that you talk about, 
called upon to utter its tones on a question like that. 
If he who last year was so pained lest an American 
citizen away — Grod knows where! in some latitude 
beyond the Rocky Mountains, should be obedient to 
British law — if he whose patriotic and republican 
apprehension was so painfully excited lest the right 
of habeas corpus and trial by Jury, which every Eng- 
lishman carries with him in his pocket wherever he 
goes, should be made to bear upon an American 



350 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

citizen — were called upon to speak upon such a 
proposition as that which I have supposed, I should 
certainly like to hear how he would treat it. Yet, 
the question being reversed, that is precisely the 
condition in which Mexico stood toward you after 
San Jacinto was fought, and on the day Texas was 
annexed. 

Your people did go to Texas. I remember it well. 
They went to Texas to fight for their rights. They 
could not fight for them in their own country. Well, 
they fought for their rights. They conquered them ! 
They "conquered a peace ! " They were your citizens 
— not Mexicans. They were recent emigrants to 
that country. They went there for the very purpose 
of seizing on that country, and making it a free and 
independent republic, with the view, as soine of them 
said, of bringing it into the American Confederacy 
in due time. Is this poor Celtic brother of yours in 
Mexico — ^is the Mexican man sunk so low that he 
can not hear what fills the mouth and ear of rumor 
all over this country? He knows that this was the 
settled purpose of some of your people. He knows 
that your avarice had fixed its eagle glance on these 
rich acres in Mexico, and that your proud power 
counted the number that could be brought against 
you, and that your avarice and your j^ower together 
marched on to the subjugation of the third or fourth 
part of the republic of Mexico, and took it from her. 
We knew this, and knowing it, what should have 
been the feeling and sentiment in the mind of the 
President of the United States toward such a people 



ON THE MEXICAT^ WAE. 351 

• — a people at least in their own opinion so deeply 
injured by us as were these Mexicans. 

The Republic of Texas comes under the Govern- 
ment of the United States, and it happens that the 
minister resident at your court — and it is a pretty 
respectable court, Mr. President — we have something 
of a king — not for life it is true, but a quadrennial 
sort of a monarch, who does very much as he pleases — 
the minister resident at that court of yours stated at 
the time that this revolted province of Texas was 
claimed by Mexico, and that if you received it as 
one of the sovereign States of this Union, right or 
wrong, it was impossible to reason with his people 
about it — ^they would consider it as an act of hostility. 
Did 3^ou consult the national feeling of Mexico then? 

The President has now to deal with a people thus 
humbled, thus irritated. It was his duty to concede 
much to Mexico; everything but his country's honor 
or her rights. Was this done ? Not at all ! Mexico 
and her minister were alike spurned as weak and 
trivial things, whose complaints 3^ou w^ould not hear 
or heed ; and when she humbly imjDlored you not to 
take this province — declared that it might disturb the 
peace subsisting between us — ^you were still inexor- 
able. During this time, she was forcing loans from 
her citizens to pay the debt she owed yours, fultilling 
her treaties with you by painful exactions from her 
own people. She begged of you to let Texas alone. 
If she were independent, let her enjoy her independ- 
ence; if free, let her revel in her new-born liberty, 
in defiance of Mexico, as she alleged she would and 



352 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWES". 

could. Your stern reply was. Xo I we will, at your 
expense, strengthen our own arm, by uniting to our- 
selves that which has been severed li*om you by our 
citizens ; we will take Texas ; we will throw the shield 
of our Constitution over her rights, and the sword 
of our power shall gleam like that at Eden, -turning 
every Wiiy,"' to gimrd her against fmther attack. 

Her minister, his remonstrance failing, leaves you. 
He tells you that he can not remain, because you had 
created, by this act, hostile relations with his gov- 
ernment. At last you are informed that ^Mexico will 
receive a commission to treat of this Texan boun- 
dary, if you will condescend to negotiate. Instead 
of sendino- a commissioner to treat of iliat, the onlv 
difficult question between the two Republics, you send 
a full minister, and requii'e that he shall be received 
as such. If he could not be styled Minister Plenipo- 
tentiary, and so accredited, why then we must fight, 
and not negotiate for a boundary. The then Mexican 
president, the representative of some faction then only, 
was tottering to his fall. His minister besought Mr. 
Slidell not to press his reception then. He was told 
that the excited feelings of the Mexican people were 
such that he must delay for a time. To this petition 
what answer is returned? You shall receive me 
noii:: you shall receive me as minister, and not as 
commissioner; you shall receive me as though the 
most pacific relations existed between the two 
countries. Thus, and not otherwise, shall it be. Such 
was the haughty, imperious tone of Mr. Slidell, and 
he acted up cvXx to the spirit of his instructions. 



ox THE MEXICAN WAR. 353 

Let any one peruse the correspondence I have re- 
ferred to, and he will see that I have truly represented 
its spirit, be its letter what it may. This is done 
under the instructions of a cabinet here, who repre- 
sented themselves in our public documents, as sigh- 
ing, panting for peace ; as desiring, above all things, 
to treat these distracted, contemned Mexicans in such 
a way, that not the shadow of a complaint against us 
shall be seen. From this correspondence it is per- 
fectly clear, that if Mr. Slidell had been sent in the 
less ostentatious character of co7nmissioner, to treat 
of the Texan boundary, that treaties and not bullets 
would have adjusted the question. But this w^as not 
agreeable to the lofty conceptions of the President. 
He preferred a vigorous war to the tame process of 
peaceful adjustment. He now throws down the pen 
of the diplomat, and grasps the sword of the warrior. 
Your army, with brave old "Rough and Ready" at 
its head, is ordered to pass the Nueces, and advance 
to the east bank of the Rio Grrande. There, sir, 
between these two rivers, lies that slip of territory, 
that chapparal thicket, interspersed with Mexican 
haciendas, out of which this wasteful, desolating war 
arose. Was this territory beyond the river Nueces 
in the State of Texas ? 

Now I have said, that I would not state any dis- 
putable fact. It is known to every man who has 
looked into this subject, that a revolutionary govern- 
ment can claim no jurisdiction anywhere when it has 
not defined and exercised its power with the sword. 
It was utterly inditferent to Mexico and the world 
23 



354 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

what legislative enactments Texas made. She ex- 
tended her revolutionary government and her revo- 
lutionary dominion not one inch beyond the extent to 
which she had carried the power of Texas in opposi- 
tion to the power of Mexico. 

It is therefore a mere question of fact ; and how 
will it be pretended that that country, lying between 
the Nueces and the Del Norte, to which your army 
was ordered, and of which it took possession, was 
subject to Texan law and not Mexican law ? What 
did your general find there? What did he write 
home ? Do you hear of any trial by jury on the east 
bank of the Rio Grande — of Anglo Saxons making 
cotton there with their negroes ? 'No ! You hear of 
Mexicans residing peacefully there, but fleeing from 
their cotton-fields at the approach of your army — no 
slaves, for it had been a decree of the Mexican gov- 
ernment, years ago, that no slaves should exist there. 
If there were a Texan population on the east bank 
oi the Rio Grande, why did not General Taylor hear 
something of those Texans hailing the advent of the 
American army, coming to protect them from the 
ravages of the Mexicans, and the more murderous 
onslaughts of the neighboring savages ? 

Do you hear anything of that ? No ! On the coi. 
trary, the population fled at the approach of your 
army. In God's name, I wish to know if it has come 
to this, that when an American army goes to protect 
American citizens on American territory, they flee 
from it, as if from the most barbarous enemy ? Yet 
such is the ridiculous assumption of those who pre- 



ox THE MEXICAX AYAE. 355 

tend that, on the east bank of the Hio Grrancle, where 
your arms took possession, there were Texan popuki- 
tion, Texan power, Texan kiws, and American United 
States power and law! JN^o, Mr. President, when I 
see that stated in an Executive document, written 
by the finger of a President of the United States, and 
when you read in those documents, with which your 
tables groan, the veracious account of that noble old 
Greneral Taylor, of his reception in that country, and 
of those men — to use the language of one of his offi- 
cers — fleeing before the invaders ; when you compare 
these two documents together, is it not a biting sar- 
casm upon the smcerity of public men — a bitter satire 
upon the gravity of all public affairs? 

Can it be, Mr. President, that -the honest, gen- 
erous. Christian people of the United States will give 
countenance to this egregious, palpable misrepre- 
sentation of fact — this bold falsification of history? 
Shall it be written down in your public annals, when 
the world looking on and you yourselves know, that 
Mexico, and not Texas, possessed this territory to 
which your armies marched ? As Mexico had never 
been dispossessed by Texan power, neither Texas 
nor your Government had any more claim to it than 
you now have to California, that other possession of 
Mexico over which your all-grasping avarice has 
already extended its remorseless dominion. 

Mr. President, there is absent to-day a Senator 
from the other side of the House wdiose presence 
would afford me, as it always does, but particularly 
on this occasion, a most singular gratification. I 



356 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

allude to the Senator from Missouri who sits furthest 
from me (Mr. Benton). I remember, Mr. President, 
he arose in this body and performed a great act of 
justice to himself and to his country — of justice to 
mankind, for all men are interested in the truths of 
history — when he declared it to be his purj)ose, for 
the sake of the truth of history, to set right some 
gentlemen, on the other side of the House, in respect 
to the territory of Oregon, which then threatened to 
disturb the peace of this Republic with the kingdom 
of Grreat Britain. I wish it had pleased him to have 
performed the same good offices on this occasion. 

I wish it had been so, if he could have found it 
consonant with his duty to his country, that now, 
while engaged with an enemy whom we have no rea- 
son to fear, as being ever able to check our j)rogTess 
or disturb our internal peace, for the sake of justice, 
as then he did for the sake of justice and the interest 
and peace of those two countries, England and Amer- 
ica, he had come forward to settle the truth of his- 
tory in respect to the territorial boundary of Texas, 
which our President said was the Rio Bravo — the 
"Rio del JSTorte," as it is sometimes called. I express 
this wish for no purpose of taunting the Senator from 
Missouri, or leading him to believe that I would 
draw his name into the discussion for any other than 
the most sacred purposes which can animate the 
human bosom — that of having truth established ; for 
I really believe that that is true which the Senator 
from Michigan stated yesterday, that the worst said 
in the Senate is, that much might be said on both 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 357 

sides ! I can not view it in that way. Much may be 
said, much talk may be had on both sides on any 
question, but that this is a disputable matter about 
which a man could apply his mind for an hour and 
still be in doubt, is to me an inscrutable mystery. 

I wish to invoke the authority of the Senator from 
Missouri. When about to receive Texas into the 
United States he offered a resolution to this effect : 

" That the incorporation of the left bank of the Rio del Norte 
(Rio Grande) into the American Union, by virtue of a treaty with 
Texas, comprehending, as the said incorporation would do, a part 
of the Mexican departments of New Mexico, Chihuahua, Coahuila 
and Tamaulipas, WOULD BE AN ACT OF DIRECT AGGRES- 
SION ON MEXICO, yb?' all the consequences of which the United 
States would stand responsible." 

I beg, Mr. President, to add to this another author- 
ity which I am sure will not be contradicted by any 
calling themselves Democrats. In the summer of 
1844, Mr. Silas Wright, in an elaborate address 
delivered at Watertown, JST. Y., said : 

" There is another subject on which I feel bound to speak a 
word ; I allude to the proposition to annex Texas to the terri- 
tory of this republic. I felt it my duty to vote as Senator, and 
did vote against the ratification of the treaty for the annexation. 
I believed that the treaty, from the boundaries that must be 
implied from it, if Mexico would not treat with us, embraced a 
country to which Texas had no claim — over which she had never 
asserted jurisdiction, and which she had no right to cede. On this 
point I should give a brief explanation. 

" The treaty ceded Texas by name without an effort to describe 
a boundary. The Congress of Texas had passed an act declaring, 



358 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

by metes and bounds, what was Texas witbin tbeir power and 
jurisdiction. It appeared to me tben, if Mexico should tell us, 
' "VVe don't know you, we have no treaty to make with you,' 
and we were left to take possession by force, we must take the 
country as Texas had ceded it to us ; and in doing that, or for-- 
feiting our own Jionor, we must do injustice to 3fcxico, and take a 
large portioyi of New Mexico, the people of which have never been 
iinder the jurisdiction of Texas; this, to me, ivas an insurmountable 
harrier — / coxdd not place the country in that position^ 

How did your officers consider this question? 
While in camp opposite to Matamoras, being then 
on the left bank of the Rio Grande, between the 
latter river and the Nueces, a most respectable 
officer writes thus to his friend in New York: 

"Camp opposite Matamoras, April 19, 1846. 
" Our situation here is an extraordinary one. Right in the 
enemy\ country, actually occupying their corn and cotton-fields, the 
people of the soil leaving their homes, and we, with a small handful 
of men, marching, with colors flying and drums beating, right 
under the guns of one of their principal cities, displaying the 
star-spangled banner, as if in defiance, under their very nose, 
and they, with an army twice our size at least, sit quietly down, 
and make not the least resistance, not the first effort to drive 
the invaders off. There is no parallel to it." 

Sir, did this officer consider himself in Texas? 
Were they our own Texan citizens, who, in the 
language of the letter, ^^did not make the first effort 
to drive the i7ivaders offV If it had been Texas 
there^ would that State consider it invasmi, or her 
people fly from your standard? ^^The 2^<^o]ile of the 
soil leaving their homes T^ Wlio were those "p^o/^/e 



ON THE MEXICAN WAK. 359 

of the soil'?''' Sir, they were Mexicans, never con- 
quered by Texas, and never subject to her laws, and 
therefore n«v^er transferred by annexation to your 
dominion ; and therefore, histly, your army, by order 
of the President, without the consent or advice of 
Congress, made war on Mexico, by invading her ter- 
ritory, in April, 1846. 

Mr. President, the Senator from Missouri was 
right. " The incorporation of the left bank of the 
Rio Grrande into the American Union," was "an act 
of direct aggression on Mexico," as his resolution 
most truthfully alleged. We, or at least the Presi- 
dent, has attempted to incorporate the left bank of 
the Rio del JSTorte, or the Rio Grande, into the Union, 
and the consequence, the legitimate consequence, war, 
has come upon us. The President, in his message, 
asserts the boundary of Texas to be the Rio Grande. 
The Senator from Missouri asserts the left bank of 
that river to be Mexican territory. Sir, it is not for 
me, who stand here an humble man, who pretend 
not to be one of those Pharisees who know all the 
law and obey it, but who, like the poor publican, 
would stand afar off and smite my breast, and say 
God be merciful to me, a poor Whig. When the 
anointed high priests in the Temple of Democracy 
differ on a point of fact, it is not for me to decide 
between them. Is it for me to say that the Senator 
from Missouri was ignorant and the President om- 
niscient ? Is it for me to say that the President was 
right and the Senator from Missouri wrong ? If it 
were true that Texan laws had been, since 1836, as 



360 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

the President's action seems to declare, how haj^pened 
it that when General Taylor went to Point Isabel, 
the people set tire to their houses and fl^l the place ? 
And how did it happen that there was a custom- 
house there, there, in Texas, as you now allege ? A 
Mexican custom-house in Texas, where, ever since 
1836, and for one whole year after the State of 
Texas became yours, a Mexican officer collected 
taxes of all who traded there, and paid these duties 
into the Mexican treasury! Sir, is it credible that 
this State of Texas allowed Mexican laws and 
Mexican power to exist within her borders for seven 
years after her independence? I should think a 
l)eople so prompt to tight for their rights might have 
burned some powder for the expulsion of Mexican 
usurpers from Texan territory. Sir, the history of 
this country is full of anomalies and contradictions. 
WTiat a patriotic, harmonious people ! When Taylor 
comes to protect them, they fire their dwellings and 
fly ! When you come in peace, bristling in arms for 
protection only — your eagle spreading its wings to 
shield from harm all American citizens — ^what then 
happens? Why, according to your own account, 
these Anglo Saxon republicans are so terrified at the 
sight of their country's flag, that they abandon their 
homes, and retreat before your army, as if some 
iS"omad tribe had wandered thither to enslave their 
families and plunder their estates ! 
i/A11 this mass of undeniable fact, known even to 
the careless reader of the public prints, is so utterly 
at war with the studiously-contrived statements in 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 361 

your cabinet documents, that I do not wonder at all 
that an amiable national pride, however misplaced 
here, has presented hitherto a thorough and fearless 
investigation of- their truth. Nor, sir, would I probe 
thi^ feculent mass of misrepresentation, had I not 
been compelled to it in defense of votes which I was 
obliged to record here, within the last ten days. Sir, 
with my opinions as to facts connected with this 
subject, and my deductions, unavoidable, from them, 
I should have been unworthy the high-souled State 
I represent, had I voted men and money to prosecute 
further a war commenced, as it now appears, in 
aggression, and carried on by rej^etition only of the 
original wrong. Am I mistaken in this ? If I am, 
I shall hold him the dearest friend I can own, in any 
relation of life, who shall show me my error. If I 
am wrong in this question of fact, show me how I 
err, and gladly will I retrace my steps ; satisfy me 
that my country was in peaceful and rightful pos- 
session between the JSTueces and Rio Grande when 
Greneral Taylor's army was ordered there ; show me 
that at Palo Alto and Resaca de las Palmas blood 
was shed on American soil in American possession, 
and then, for the defense of that possession, I will 
vote away the last dollar that power can wring from 
the people, and send every man able to bear a musket 
to the ranks of war. But until I shall be thus con- 
vinced, duty to myself, to truth, to conscience, to 
public justice, requires that I persist in every lawful 
opposition to this war. 

While the American President can command the 



362 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

army, thank Heaven I can command the purse. 
While the President, under the penalty of death, 
can command your officers to proceed, I can tell 
them to come back, or the President can supply 
them as he may. He shall have no funds from me 
in the prosecution of a war which I can not approve. 
That I conceive to be the duty of a Senator. I am 
not mistaken in that. If it be my duty to grant 
whatever the President demands, for what am I 
here? Have I no will upon the subject? Is it not 
placed at my discretion, understanding, judgment? 
Have an American Senate and flouse of Repre- 
sentatives nothing to do but obey the bidding of 
the President, as the army he commands is com- 
pelled to obey under penalty of death ? 'No ! The 
representatives of the sovereign jieople and sovereign 
States were never elected for such purposes as that. 

Have Senators reflected on the great power which 
the command of armies in war confers upon any one, 
but especially on him who is at once the civil and 
military chief of the government ? It is very well 
that we should look back to see how the friends of 
popular rights regarded this subject in former times. 
Prior to the revolution of 1688, in England, all grants 
of money by Parliament were general. Specific ap- 
propriations before that period were unknown. The 
king could, out of the general revenues, aj^propriate 
any or all of them to any Avar or other object, as 
best suited his own unrestrained wishes. Henct, in 
the last struggle with the first Charles, the Parlia- 
ment insisted that he should yield uj") the command 



ox THE MEXICAN WAR. 363 

of the army raised to quell the Irish rebellion to 
such person as Parliament should choose. The men 
of that day saw that with the unrestricted control of 
revenue, and the power to name the commander of 
the army, the king was master of the liberties of the 
people. Wherefore Charles, after he had yielded up 
almost every other kingly prerogative, was (in order 
to secure Parliament and the people against military 
rule) required to give up the command of the forces. 
It was his refusal to do this that brought his head to 
the block. "Give up the command of the army!" 
was the last imperative demand of the foes of arbi- 
trary power then. What was the reply of that 
unhappy representative of the doomed race of the 
Stuarts? "Not for an hour, by God!" was the 
stern answer. Wentworth had always advised his 
royal master never to yield up the right to command 
the army; such, too, was the counsel of the queen, 
whose notions of kingly power were all fashioned 
after the most despotic models. This power over the 
army by our Constitution is conceded to aar king. 
Give him money at his will, as we are told we must, 
and you have set up in this Republic just such a 
tyrant as him against whom the friends of English 
liberty were compelled to wage war. It was a hard 
necessity, but still it was demanded as the only 
security for any reasonable measure of jDublic liberty. 
Such men as Holt and Somers had not yet taught 
the people of England the secret of controlling arbi- 
trary power by specific appropriations of money, and 
withholding these, when the king proclaimed his 



364 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

intention to use the grant for any purpose not ap- 
proved by the Commons, the true representatives of 
popuhir rights in Enghmd. 

When, in 1688, this doctrine of specific appropria- 
tions became a part of the British constitution, the 
King could safely be trusted with the control of the 
army. If war is made there by the Crown, and the 
Commons do not approve of it, refusal to grant sup- 
plies is the easy remedy — one, too, which renders it 
impossible for a king of England to carry forward 
any war which may be displeasing to the English 
people. Yes, sir, in England, since 1688, it has not 
been in the power of a British sovereign to do that, 
which in your boasted Republic, an American 23resi- 
dent, under the auspices of what you call Democracy, 
has done — make war, without consent of the legis- 
lative power. In England, supplies are at once 
refused, if Parliament does not approve the objects 
of the war. Here, we are told, we must not look to 
the objects of the war, being in the imr — made by the 
President — we must help him to fight it out, should 
it even please him to carry it to the utter extermina- 
tion of the Mexican race. Sir, I believe it must pro- 
ceed to this shocking extreme, if you are, by war, to 
"conquer a peace." Here, then, is your condition. 
The President involves you in war without your con- 
sent. Being in such a war, it is demanded as a duty, 
that we grant men and money to carry it on. The 
President tells us he shall prosecute this w^ar, till 
Mexico pays us, or agrees to pay us, all its expenses. 
I am not willing to scourge Mexico thus ; and the 



ox THE MEXICAN WAR. 365 

only means left me is to say to the commander-in- 
chief, " Gall home your army, I will feed and clothe 
it no longer ; you have whipped Mexico into three 
pitched battles, this is revenge enough ; this is pun- 
ishment enough." 

The President has said he does not expect to hold 
Mexican territory by conquest. Why then conquer 
it ? Why waste thousands of lives and millions of 
money fortifying towns and creating governments, if, 
at the end of the war, you retire from the graves of 
your soldiers and the desolated country of your foes, 
only to get money from Mexico for the expense of 
all your toil and sacrifice ? Who ever heard, since 
Christianity Avas propagated among men, of a nation 
taxing its people, enlisting its 3^oung men, and march- 
ing oif two thousand miles to fight a people merely 
to be paid for it in money ! What is this but hunting 
a market for blood, selling the lives of your young 
men, marching them in regiments to be slaughtered 
and paid for, like oxen and brute beasts ? Sir, this 
is, when stripped naked, that atrocious idea first pro- 
mulgated in the President's message, and now advo- 
cated here, of fighting on till we can get our indem- 
nity for the past as well as the present slaughter. 
We have chastised Mexico, and if it were worth while 
to do so, we have, I dare say, satisfied the world that 
w^e can fight. What now ! Why, the mothers of 
America are asked to send another of their sons to 
blow out the brains of Mexicans because they refuse 
to pay the price of the first who fell there, fighting 
for glor}^ ! And what if the second fall too ? The 



366 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

Executive, the parental reply, is, "we shall have 
him paid for, we shall get full indemnity!" Sir, I 
have no patience with this flagitious notion of fight- 
ing for indemnity, and this under the equally absurd 
and hypocritical j)i'etense of securing an honorable 
peace. An honorable peace! If you have accom- 
l^lished the objects of the war (if indeed you had an 
object wdiich you dare to avow), cease to fight, and 
you will have peace. Conquer your insane love of 
false glory, and you will " conquer a peace." Sir, if 
your commander-in-chief will not do this, I will 
endeavor to compel him, and as I find no other 
means, I shall refuse supplies — without the money 
of the people, he can not go further. He asks me for 
that money ; I wish him to bring your armies home, 
to cease shedding blood for money ; if he refuses, I 
will refuse supplies, and then I know he must^ he will 
cease his further sale of the lives of my countrymen. 
May we not, oiiglit we not now to do this ? I can hear 
no reason why we should not, except this : it is said 
that we are in war, wrongfully it may be, but, being 
in, the President is responsible, and we must give 
kirn the means he requires ! He responsible ! Sir, we, 
we are responsible, if having the power to stay this 
plague, we refuse to do so. When it shall be so — 
when the American Senate and the American House 
of Representatives can stoop from their high position, 
and yield a dumb compliance with the behests of a 
president who is, for the time being, commander of 
your army ; when they will open the treasury with 
one hand, and the veins of all the soldiers in the land 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 367 

with the other, merely because the President com- 
mands, then, sir, it matters little how soon some 
Cromwell shall come into this Hall and say, "the 
Lord hath no further need of you here." When 
we fail to do the work, " whereunto we were 
sent," we shall be, we ought to be, removed, and 
give place to others who will. The fate of the bar- 
ren fig-tree will be ours — Christ cursed it and it 
withered. 

Mr. President, I dismiss this branch of the subject, 
and beg the indulgence of the Senate to some reflec- 
tions on the particular bill now under consideration. 
I voted for a bill somewhat like the present at the 
last session — our army was then in the neighborhood 
of our line. I then hoped that the President did sin- 
cerely desire a peace. Our army had not then pene- 
trated far into Mexico, and I did hope that with the 
two millions then proposed, we might get peace, and 
avoid the slaughter, the shame, the crime, of an 
aggressive, unprovoked war. But now you have 
overrun half of Mexico, you have exasperated and 
irritated her people, you claim indemnity for all 
expenses incurred in doing this mischief, and boldly 
ask her to give up N'ew Mexico and California ; and, 
as a bribe to her patriotism, seizing on her property, 
you offer three millions to pay the soldiers she has 
called out to repel your invasion, on condition that 
she will give up to you at least one-third of her whole 
territory. This is the modest — I should say, the mon- 
strous — proposition now before us, as explained by 
the chairman of the committee on Foreign Relations 



368 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

[Mr. Sevier], who reported the bill. I can not now 
give my assent to this. 

But, sir, I do not believe you will succeed. I am 
not informed of your prospects of success with this 
measure of peace. The chairman of the committee 
of Foreign Relations tells us that he has every rea- 
son to believe that peace can be obtained if we grant 
this appropriation. What reason have you, Mr. 
Chairman, for that opinion ? " Facts which I can not 
disclose to you — correspondence which it would be 
improper to name here — facts which I know, but 
which you are not permitted to know, have satisfied 
the committee, that peace may be purchased, if you 
will but grant these three millions of dollars." Now, 
Mr, President, I wish to know if I am required to act 
upon such opinions of the chairman of the committee 
on Foreign Relations, formed upon facts which he 
refuses to disclose to me ? No ! I must know the facts 
before I can form my judgment. But I am to take it 
for granted that there must be some prospect of an end 
to this dreadful war — for it is a dreadful war, being, as 
I believe in my conscience it is, an unjust war. Is it 
possible that for three millions you can purchase a 
peace with Mexico? How? By the j^urchase of Cali- 
fornia ? Mr. President, I know not what facts the 
chairman of the committee on Foreign Aifairs may 
have had access to. I know not what secret agents 
have been whispering into the ears of the authorities 
of Mexico ; but of one thing I am certain, that by a 
cession of California and New Mexico you never can 
purchase a peace with her. 



ON THE mexica:n^ wae. 369 

You may wrest provinces from Mexico by war — 
you may hold them by the right of the strongest — 
you may rob her, but a treaty of peace to that eifect 
with the people of Mexico, legitimately and freely 
made, 3^ou neA^er will have ! I thank God that it is 
so, as well for the sake of the Mexican people as our- 
selves, for unlike the Senator from Alabama [Mr. 
Bagby], I do not value the life of a citizen of the 
United States above the lives of a hundred thousand 
Mexican women and children — a rather cold sort of 
philanthropy, in my judgment. For the sake of 
Mexico then, as well as our own country, I rejoice 
that it is an impossibility, that you can obtain by 
treaty from her those territories, under the existing 
state of things. 

I am somewhat at a loss to know, on what plan of. 
operations gentlemen having charge of this war in- 
tend to proceed. We hear much said of the terror 
of your arms. The affrighted Mexican, it is said, 
when you shall have drenched his country in blood, 
will sue for peace, and thus you will indeed "conquer 
peace." This is the heroic and savage tone in which 
we have heretofore been lectured by our friends on 
the other side of the chamber, especially by the Sen- 
ator from Michigan [Greneral Cass]. But suddenly 
the chairman of the committee on Foreign Relations 
comes to us with a smooth phrase of diplomacy, 
made potent by the gentle suasion of gold. The 
chairman of the committee on Military Affairs calls 
for thirty millions of money and ten thousand regular 
troops; these, we are assured, shall "conquer peace," 
•24 



370 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

if the obstinate Celt refuses to treat till we shall whip 
him in another field of blood. What a delightful 
scene in the nineteenth century of the Christian era? 
What an interesting sight to see these two represent- 
atives of war and peace moving in grand procession 
throuo-h the halls of the Montezumas ! The Senator 
from Michigan [Greneral Cass], red with the blood 
of recent slaughter, the gory spear of Achilles in his 
hand, and the hoarse clarion of war in his mouth, 
blowing a blast "so loud and deep" that the sleeping 
echoes of the lofty Cordilleras start from their cav- 
erns and return the sound, till every ear from Panama 
to Santa Fe is deafened with the roar. By his side, 
with "modest mien and downcast look," comes the 
Senator from Arkansas [Mr. Sevier], covered from 
head to foot with a gorgeous robe, glittering and em- 
bossed with three millions of shining gold, putting to 
shame, "the wealth of Ormus or of Ind." The olive 
of Minerva graces his brow ; in his right hand is the 
delicate rebeck, from which are breathed, in Lydian 
measure, notes "that tell of naught but love and 
peace." I fear very much, you will scarcely be able 
to explain to the simple, savage mind of the halt- 
civilized Mexicans, the puzzling dualism of this 
scene, at once gorgeous and grotesque. Sir, I 
scarcely understand the meaning of all this myself. 
If we are to vindicate our rights b}^ battles — in 
bloody fields of w\ar — let us do it. If that is not the 
plan, why then let us call back our armies into our 
own territory, and propose a treaty with Mexico, 
based upon the proposition that money is better for 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 371 

her and land is better for us. Thus we can treat 
Mexico like an equal and do honor to ourselves. But 
what is it you ask? You have taken from Mexico 
one-fourth of her territory, and you now propose to 
run a line comprehending about another third, and 
for what ? I ask, Mr. President, for what ? What 
has Mexico got from you, for parting with two-thirds 
of her domain ? She has given you ample redress 
for every injur}" of which you have complained. She 
has submitted to the award of your commissioners, 
and up to the time of the rupture with Texas, faith- 
fully paid it. And for all that she has lost (not 
through or by you, but which loss has been your 
gain), what requital do we, her strong, rich, robust 
neighbor, make? Do we send our missionaries there 
"to point the way to heaven?" Or do we send the 
schoolmasters to pour daylight into her dark places, 
to aid her infiint strength to conquer freedom, and 
reap the fruit of the independence herself alone had 
won? 'No, no, none of this do we. But we send 
regiments, storm towns, and our colonels prate of 
liberty in the midst of the solitudes their ravages 
have made. They proclaim the empty forms of 
social compact to a people bleeding and maimed 
with wounds received in defending their hearth- 
stones against the invasion of these very men who 
shoot them down, and then exhort them to be free. 
Your chaplains of the navy throw aside the New 
Testament and seize a bill of rights. The Bev. Don 
Walter Colton, I see, abandons the Sermon on the 
Mount, and betakes himself to Blackstone and Kent, 



V 



372 SPEECHES' OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

and is elected a Justice of the Peace! He takes 
military possession of some town in California, and 
instead of teaching the plan of tbe atonement and 
the way of salvation to the poor, ignorant Celt, he 
presents Colt's pistol to his ear, and calls on him to 
take "trial by jury and habeas corpus,''^ or nine 
bullets in his head. Oh! Mr. President, are you not 
the lights of the earth, if not its salt ? You, you are 
indeed opening the eyes of the blind in Mexico, with 
a most emphatic and exoteric power. Sir, if all this 
were not a sad, mournful truth, it would be the very 
"ne plus ultra of the ridiculous. . 

But sir let us see what, as the chairman of the 
committee of Foreign Relations explains it, we are 
to get by the combined processes of conquest and 
treaty. 

What is the territory, Mr. President, which you 
propose to \vi'est from Mexico? It is consecrated to 
the heart of the Mexican by many a well-fought 
battle, with his old Castilian master. His Bunker 
Hills, and Saratogas, and Yorktowns are there. 
The Mexican can say, "There I bled for liberty! and 
shall I surrender that consecrated home of my affec- 
tions to the Anglo Saxon invaders? What do they 
want with it? They have Texas already. They 
have possessed themselves of the territory between 
the Nueces and the Rio Grande. What else do they 
want ? To what shall I point my children as memo- 
rials of that independence which I bequeath to 
them, when those battle-fields shall have passed from 
my possession ? " 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 373 

Sir, had one come and demanded Bunker Hill of 
the people of Massachusetts, had England's lion ever 
showed himself there, is there a man over thirteen, 
and under ninety who would not have been ready to 
meet him — is there a river on this continent that 
would not have run red with blood — is there a field 
but would have been piled high with the unburied 
bones of slaughtered Americans before these con- 
secrated battle-fields of liberty should have been 
wrested from us? But this same American goes 
into a sister republic, and says to poor, weak Mexico, 
" Give up your territory — you are unworthy to pos- 
sess it — I have got one-half already — all I ask of you 
is to give up the other! " England might as well, in 
the circumstances I have described, have come and 
demanded of us, "Grive up the Atlantic slope — give 
up this trifling territory from the Alleghany moun- 
tains to the sea; it is only from Maine to St. Mary's' 
■ — only about one-third of your Republic, and the 
least interesting portion of it." What would be the 
response ? They would say, we must give this up to 
John Bull. Why? "He wants room." The Sen- 
ator from Michigan says he must have this. Why, 
my worthy Christian brother, on what princij^le of 
j u stice ? " I want room ! " 

Sir, look at this pretense of want of room. With 
twenty millions of people, you have about one thou- 
sand millions of acres of land, inviting settlement by 
every conceivable argument — bringing them down to 
a quarter of a dollar an acre, and allowing every 
man to squat where he pleases. But the Senator 



374 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

from Michigan says we will be two hundred millions 
in a few years, and we want room. If I were a 
Mexican I would tell you, "Have you not room in 
your own country to bury your dead men ? If you 
come into mine we will greet you with bloody hands, 
and welcome you to hospitable graves." 

Why, says the chairman of this committee of 
Foreign Relations, it is the most reasonable thing 
in the w^orld ! We ought to have the Bay of San 
Francisco. Why? Because it is the best harbor 
on the Pacific ! It has been my fortune, Mr. Presi- 
d(yit, to have practiced a good deal in criminal courts 
in the course of my life, but I never yet heard a 
thief, arraigned for stealing a horse, plead that it 
was the best horse that he could find in the country ! 
We want California. What for? Why, says the 
Senator from Michigan, we will have it; and the 
'Senator from South Carolina, with a very mistaken 
view, I think, of policy, says, you can't keep our 
2)eople from going there. I don't desire to prevent 
them. Let them go and seek their happiness in 
whatever country or clime it pleases them. 

All I ask of them is, not to require this Govern- 
ment to protect them with that banner consecrated 
to war waged for princij^les — eternal, enduring truth. 
Sir, it is not meet that our old flag should throw its 
protecting folds over expeditions for lucre or for land, 
r.ut you still say, you want room for your people. 
This has been the plea of every robber-chief from 
Nimrod to the present hour. I dare say, when 
Tamerlane descended from his throne built of 



ON THE MEXICAN WAR. 375 

seventy thousand human skulls, and marched his 
ferocious battalions to further slaughter, I dare say 
he said, " I want room." Bajazet was another gen- 
tleman of kindred tastes and wants with us Anglo 
Saxons — he "wanted room." Alexander, too, the 
mighty "Macedonian madman," when he wandered 
|with his Greeks to the plains of India, and fought a 
bloody battle on the very ground where recently 
England and the Sikhs engaged in strife for "room," 
was no doubt in quest of some California there. Many 
a Monterey had he to storm to get "room." Sir, he 
made quite as much of that sort of history as you 
ever will. Mr. President, do you remember the last 
chapter in that history? It is soon read. Oh! I 
wish V. e could but understand its moral. Ammon's 
son (so was Alexander named), after all his victories, 
died drunk in Babylon ! The vast empire he con- 
quered to "get room" became the prey of the generals 
he had trained ; it was disparted, torn to pieces, and 
so ended. Sir, there is a very significant appendix; 
it is this: the descendants of the Greeks — of Alex- 
ander's Greeks — are now governed by a descendant 
of Attila ! Mr. President, while we are fighting for 
room, let us ponder deeply this appendix. I was 
somewhat amazed, the other day, to hear the Senator 
from Michigan declare that Europe had quite for- 
gotten us till these battles waked them up. I sup- 
pose the Senator feels grateful to the President for 
"waking up" Europe. Does the President, who is, 
I hope, read in civic as well as military lore, re- 
member the saying of one who had pondered upon 



376 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

history long — long, too, upon man, his nature and 
true destiny ? Montesquieu did not think highly of 
this way of "waking uj)." "Happy," says he, "is 
that nation whose annals are tiresome." 

The Senator from Michigan has a different view 
of this. He thinks that a nation is not distinguished 
until it is distinguished in war; he fears that the 
slumbering faculties of Europe have not been able 
to ascertain that there are twenty millions of Anglo 
Saxons here, making railroads and canals, and speed- 
ing all the arts of peace to the utmost accomplish- 
ment of the most refined civilization. They do not 
know it! And what is the wonderful expedient 
which this democratic method of making history 
would adopt in order to make us known ? Storm- 
ing cities, desolating peaceful, happy homes, shoot- 
ing men — ay, sir, such is war — and shooting 
women, too ! 

Sir, I have read, in some account of' your battle 
of Monterey, of a lovely Mexican girl, who, with 
the benevolence of an angel in her bosom, and the 
robust courage of a hero in her heart, was busily 
engaged, during the bloody conflict, amid the crash 
of falling houses, the groans of the dying, and the 
wild shriek of battle, in carrying water to slake the 
burning thirst of the wounded of either host. While 
bending over a wounded American soldier, a cannon 
ball struck her and blew her to atoms ! Sir, I do 
not charge my brave, generous-hearted countrymen 
who fought that fight with this. No, no! We who 
send them — we who know that scenes like this, 



ON THE MEXICAN WAE. 377 

which might send tears of sorrow "clown Pkito's 
iron cheek," are the invariable, inevitable attendants 
on war — we are accountable for this. And this — this 
is the way we are to be made known to Europe. 
This — this is to be the undying renown of free, repub- 
lican America! "She has stormed a city — killed 
many of its inhabitants of both sexes — she has 
room!" So it will read. Sir, if this were our only 
history, then may God of his mercy grant that its 
volume may speedily come to a close. 

Why is it, sir, that we of the United States, a 
people of yesterday compared with the older nations 
of the world, should be waging war for territory — 
for "room?" Look at your country, extending from 
the Alleghany Mountains to the Pacific Ocean, 
capable itself of sustaining, in comfort, a larger 
population than will be in the whole Union for 
one hundred years to come. Over this vast expanse 
of territory, your population is now so sparse, that I 
believe we provided, at the last session, a regiment ' 
of mounted men to guard the mail, from the frontier 
of Missouri to the mouth of the Columbia ; and yet 
you persist in the ridiculous assertion, "I want 
room." One would imagine, from the frequent re- 
iteration of the complaint, that you had a bursting, 
teeming population, whose energy was pa7:-alyzed, 
whose enterprise was crushed, for want of space. 
Why should we be so weak or wicked as to offer this 
idle apology for ravaging a neighboring republic? 
It will impose on no one at home or abroad. 

Do we not know, Mr. President, that it is a law 



378 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

never to be repealed, that falsehood shall be short- 
lived ? Was it not ordained of old that truth only 
shall abide forever ? Whatever we may say to-day, 
or whatever we may write in our books, the stern 
tribunal of history will review it all, detect false- 
hood, and bring us to judgment before that posterity 
which shall bless or curse us, as we may act now, 
wisel}^ or otherwise. We may hide in the grave 
(which awaits us all) , in vain ; we may hope there, 
like the foolish bird that hides its head in the sand, 
in the vain belief that its body is not seen, yet even 
there, this preposterous excuse of want of "room," 
shall be laid bare, and the quick-coming future will 
decide, that it was a hypocritical pretense, under 
which we sought to conceal the avarice, which 
prompted us to covet and to seize by force, that 
which was not ours. 

Mr. President, this uneasy desire to augment our 
territory, has depraved the moral sense, and blunted 
the otherwise keen sagacity of our people. What 
has been the fate of all nations who have acted upon 
the idea, that they must advance ! Our young orators 
cherish this notion with a fervid, but fatally mis- 
taken zeal. They call it by the mysterious name of 
"destiny." "Our destiny," they say, is "onward," 
and hence they argue, with ready sophistry, the pro 
priety of seizing upon any territory and any people, 
that may lie in the way of our "fated" advance 
Recently these progressives have grown classical ; 
some assiduous student of antiquities has helped 
them to a patron saint. They have wandered back 



ON THE MEXICAN WAR. 379 

into the desolated Pantheon, and there, among the 
Polytheistic relics of that "pale mother of dead em- 
pires," they have found a god whom these Romans, 
centuries gone by, baptized "Terminus."^ 

Sir, I have heard much and read somewhat of this 
gentleman Terminus. Alexander, of whom I have 
spoken, was a devotee of this divinity. We have 
seen the end of him and his empire. It was said 
to be an attribute of this god that he must always 
advance, and never recede. So both republican and 
imperial Rome believed. It was, as they said, their 
destiny. And for a while it did seem to be even so. 
Roman Terminus did advance. Under the eagles of 
Rome he was carried from his home on the Tiber, to 
the furthest East on the one hand, and to the far 
West, among the then barbarous tribes of western 
Europe, on the other. But at length the time came, 
when retributive justice had become "a destiny." The 
despised Gaul calls out to the contemned Goth, and 

^Attila, with his Huns, answers back the battle shout 
to both. The "blue-eyed nations of the North," in 
succession or united, pour forth their countless hosts 
of warriors upon Rome and Rome's always-advancing 
god Terminus. And now the battle-ax of the barba- 
rian strikes down the conquering eagle of Rome. 
Terminus at last recedes, slowly at first, but finally 

^ he is driven to Rome, and from Rome to Byzantium. 
Whoever would know the further fate of this Roman 
deity, so recently taken under the patronage of 
American Democracy, may find ample gratification 
of his curiosity, in the luminous pages of Gibbon's 



380 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

"Decline and Fall." Such Mdll find, that Rome 
thought as you now think, that it was her destiny to 
conquer provinces and nations, and no doubt she 
sometimes said as you say, "I will conquer a peace." 
and where now is she, the Mistress of the World ? 
The spider weaves his web in her palaces, the owl 
sings his watch-song in her towers. Teutonic power 
now lords it over the servile remnant, the miserable 
memento of old and once omnij^otent Rome. Sad, 
very sad, are the lessons which time has written for 
us. Through and in them all, I see nothing but the 
inflexible execution of that old law, which ordains as 
eternal, that cardinal rule, " Thou shalt not covet thy 
neighbor's goods, nor anything which is his." Since 
I have lately heard so much about the dismember- 
ment of Mexico, I have looked back to see how, in 
the course of events, which some call " Providence," 
it has fared with other nations, who engaged in this 
work of dismemberment. I see that in the latter 
half of the eighteenth century, three powerful nations, 
Russia, Austria and Prussia, united in the dismem- 
berment of Poland. They said, too, as you say, "it 
is our destiny." They "wanted room." Doubtless 
each of these thought, with his share of Poland, his 
power was too strong ever to fear invasion, or even 
insult. One had his California, another his New 
Mexico, and the third his Vera Cruz. Did they 
remain untouched and incapable of harm ? Alas ! 
1^0 — ^far, very far, from it. Retributive justice must 
fulfill its destiny, too. A very few years pass off, 
and we hear of a new man, a Corsican lieutenant, the 



ON THE MEXICAN WAK. 381 

self-named "armed soldier of Democracy," Xapoleon, 
He ravages Austria, covers her land with blood, 
drives the JSTorthern Cj^esar fi'om his capital, and 
sleeps in his jmlace. Austria may now remember 
how her power trampled upon Poland. X Did she not 
pay dear, very dear, for her California ? 

But has Prussia no atonement to make ? You see 
this same Napoleon, the blind instrument of Provi- 
dence, at work there. The thunders of his cannon 
at Jena proclaim the work of retribution for Poland's 
wrongs ; and the successors of the Great Frederick, 
the drill-sergeant of Europe, are seen flying across 
the sandy plain that surrounds their capitol, right 
glad if they may escape captivity or death. "But how 
fares it with the Autocrat of Russia? Is he secure in 
his 'share of the spoils of Poland ? No. Suddenly we 
see. sir, six hundred thousand armed men marching 
to Moscow. "^ Does his Yera Cruz protect him now ? 
Far from it. Blood, slaughter, desolation spread 
abroad over the land, and finally the conflagration 
of the old commercial metropolis of Russia, closes 
the retribution, she must pay for her share in the 
dismemberment of her weak and impotent neighbor. 
]Mr. President, a mind more prone to look for the 
judgments of Heaven in the doings of men than 
mine, can not fail in this to see the providence of 
God. When Moscow burned, it seemed as if the 
earth was lighted up, that the nations might behold 
the scene. As that mighty sea of fire gathered and 
heaved and rolled upward, and yet higher, till its 
flames licked the stars, and fired the whole heavens. 



% 



382 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

it did seem as though the God of the nations was 
writing in characters of flame on the front of his 
throne, that doom that shall fall upon the strong 
nation which tramples in scorn upon the weak. And 
what fortune awaits him, the appointed executor of 
this work, when it was all done ? He, too, conceived 
the notion that his destiny pointed onward to uni- 
versal dominion. France was too small — Europe, he 
thought, should bow down before him. But as soon 
as this idea took possession of his soul, he too be- 
comes powerless. His Terminus must recede too 
Right there, while he witnessed the humiliation, and 
doubtless meditated the subjugation of Russia, He 
who holds the winds in his fist gathered the snows of 
the north and blew them upon his six hundred thou- 
sand men ; they fled — they froze — they perished. 
And now the mighty iVapoleon, who had resolved on 
universal dominion, he^ too, is summoned to answer 
for the violation of that ancient law, " thou shalt not 
covet anything which is thy neighbor's." How is the 
mighty fallen ! He, beneath whose proud footstep 
Europe trembled, he is now an exile at Elba, and 
now finally a prisoner on the rock of St. Helena, and 
there, on a barren island, in an unfrequented sea, in 
the crater of an extinguished volcano, tliere is the 
death-bed of the mighty conqueror. All his annexa- 
tions have come to that ! His last hour is now 
come, and he, the man of destiny, he who had rocked 
the world as with the throes of an earthquake, is 
now powerless, still — even as a beggar, so he died. ^ 
On the wings of a tempest that raged with unwonted 



ox THE MEXICAN WAE. 383 

fury, up to the throne of the only Power that con- 
trolled him while he lived, went the fiery soul of that 
wonderful warrior, another witness to the existence 
of that eternal decree, that they who do not rule in 
righteousness shall perish from the earth, lie has 
found "room" at last. And France, she, too, has 
found "room." Her "eagles" now no longer scream 
along the banks of the Danube, the Po, and the 
Borysthenes. They have returned home, to their 
old eyrie, between the Alps, the Rhine, and the 
Pyrenees ;\ so shall it be with yours. You may carry 
them to the loftiest peaks of the Cordilleras, they 
may wave with insolent triumph in the Halls of the 
Montezumas, the armed men of Mexico may quail 
before them, but the w^eakest hand in Mexico, up- 
lifted in prayer to the God of Justice, may call down 
against you a Power, in the presence of which, the 
iron hearts of your warriors shall be turned into 
ashes. 

Mr. President, if the history of our race has estab- 
lished any truth, it is but a confirmation of what is 
written, "the way of the transgressor is hard." Inor- 
dinate ambition, wantoning in power, and spurning 
the humble maxims of justice has — ever has — and 
ever shall end in ruin. Strength can not always 
trample upon weakness — the humble shall be ex- 
alted, the bowed down will at length be lifted up. It 
is by faith in the law of strict justice, and the prac- 
tice of its precepts, that nations alone can be saved. 
All the annals of the human race, sacred and profane, 
are written over with this great truth, in characters 



384 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

of living light. It is my fear, my fixed belief, that 
in this invasion, this war with Mexico, we have 
forgotten this vital truth. Why is it, that we have 
been drawn into this whirlpool of war ? How clear 
and strong was the light that shone upon the path of 
duty a year ago ! The last disturbing question with 
England was settled — our power extended its peace- 
ful sway from the Atlantic to the Pacific ; from the 
Alleghanies we looked out upon Europe, and from 
the tops of the Stony Mountains we could descry the 
shores of Asia ; a rich commerce with all the nations 
of Europe poured wealth and abundance into our lap 
on the Atlantic side, while an unoccupied commerce 
of three hundred millions of Asiatics waited on the 
Pacific for our enterprise to come and possess it. 
One hundred millions of dollars will be wasted in 
this fruitless war. Had this money of the people 
been expended in making a railroad from your north- 
ern lakes to the Pacific, as one of your citizens has 
begged of you in vain, you would have made a high- 
way for the world between Asia and Europe. Your 
Capital then would be within thirty or forty days' 
travel of any and every point on the map of the civ- 
ilized world. Through this great artery of trade, 
you would have carried through the lieart of your 
own country, the teas of China, and the spices of 
India, to the markets of England and France. Why, 
why, Mr. President, did we abandon the enterprises 
of peace, and betake ourselves to the barbarous 
achievements of war? Why did we "forsake this 
fair and fertile field to batten on that moor." 



ox THE MEXICAN WAR, 385 

But, Mr. President, if further acquisition of terri- 
tory is to be the result either of conquest or treaty, 
then I scarcely know which should be preferred, 
eternal war with Mexico, or the hazards of internal 
commotion at home, which last, I fear, may come if 
another province is to be added to our territory. 
There is one topic connected with this subject which 
I tremble when I approach, and yet I can not forl^ear 
to notice it. It meets you in every step you take. 
It threatens you which way soever you go in the 
prosecution of this war. I allude to the question of 
Slavery. Opposition to its further extension, it must 
be obvious to every one, is a deej^ly-rooted determin- 
ation with men of all parties in what we call the non- 
slaveholding States. ISTew York, Pennsylvania, and 
Ohio, three of the most powerful, have already sent 
their legislative instructions here — so it will be, I 
doubt not, in all the rest. It is vain now to speculate 
about the reasons for this. Grentlemen of the South 
may call it prejudice, passion, hypocrisy, fanaticism. 
I shall not dispute with them now on that point. 
The great fact that it is so, and not otherwise, is what 
it concerns us to know. You nor I can not alter or 
change this opinion if we would. These people only 
say, we will not, can not consent that you shall carry 
slavery wdiere it does not already exist. They do 
not seek to disturb you in that institution, as it exists 
in your States. Enjoy it if jo\x will, and as you will. 
This is their language, this their determination. 
How is it in the South? Can it be expected that 
they should expend in common, their blood and their 
25 



386 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

treasure, in the acquisition of immense territory, and 
then willingly forego the right to carry thither their 
slaves, and inhabit the conquered country if they 
please to do so? Sir, I know the feelings and opin- 
ions of the South too well to calculate on this. Nay, 
I believe they would even contend to any extremity 
for the mere right, had they no wish to exert it. I 
believe (and I confess I tremble when the convic- 
tion presses upon me) that there is equal obstinacy 
on both sides of this fearful question. If then, we 
persist in w^ar, which if it terminate in anything 
short of a mere wanton waste of blood as well as 
money, must end (as this bill proposes) in the acqui- 
sition of territory, to which at once this controversy 
must attach — this bill would seem to be nothing less 
than a bill to produce internal commotion. Should 
we prosecute this war another moment, or expend 
one dollar in the pm-chase or conquest of a single 
acre of Mexican land, the T^orth and the South are 
brought into collision on a point where neither will 
yield. Who can foresee or foretell the result? Who 
so bold or reckless as to look such a conflict in the 
face unmoved! I do not envy the heart of him who 
can realize the possibility of such a conflict Avithout 
emotions too painful to be endured. Why then shall 
we, the representatives of the sovereign States of this 
Union — the chosen guardians of this confederated 
Kepublic, why should w^e j^i'scipitate this fearful 
struggle, by continuing a war, the results of which 
must be to force us at once upon it? Sir, rightly 
considered, this is treason, treason to the Union, 



ox THE MEXICAN WAR. 387 

treason to the dearest interests, the loftiest aspira- 
lions, the most cherished hopes of our constituents. 
It is a crime to risk the possibility of such a contest. 
It is a crime of such infernal hue, that every other 
in the catalogue of iniquity, when compared with it, 
whitens into virtue. Oh, Mr. President, it does seem 
to me, if hell itself could yawn and vomit up the 
fiends that inhabit its penal abodes, commissioned to 
disturb the harmony of this world, and dash the 
fairest prospect of happiness that ever allured the 
hopes of men, the first step in the consummation of 
this diabolical purpose would be, to light up the fires 
of internal war, and plunge the sister States of this 
Union into the bottomless gulf of civil strife. We 
stand this day on the crumbling brink of that gulf — 
we see its bloody eddies wheeling and boiling before 
us — shall we not pause before it be too late ! IIow 
plain again is here the path, I may add the only way 
of duty,, of prudence, of true patriotism. Let us 
abandon all idea of acquiring further territory, and 
by consequence cease at once to prosecute this war. 
Let us call home our armies, and bring them at once 
within our own acknowledged limits. Show Mexico 
that you are sincere when you say you desire nothing 
by conquest. She has learned that she can not en- 
counter you in war, and if she had not, she is too 
weak to disturb you here. Tender her peace, and 
my life on it, she will then accept it. But whether 
she shall or not, you will have peace without her con- 
sent. It is your invasion that has made war, your re- 
treat will restore peace. Let us then close forever the 



388 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

approaches of internal feud, and so return to the 
ancient concord and the old way of national pros- 
perity and permanent glory. Let us here, in this 
temple consecrated to the Union, perform a solemn 
lustration; let us wash Mexican blood from our 
hands, and on these altars, in the presence of that 
image of the Father of his country that looks down 
upon us, swear to preserve honorable peace with all 
the world, and eternal brotherhood with each other. 



INCIDENTAL REMARKS ON THE "THREE 
MILLION BILL." 

[March 1st, 1847.] 



Mr. CoRWiisr rose to explain the motives which 
influenced him in giving his vote, on a former occa- 
sion, on a bill similar to the one before the Senate, to 
which allusion had been made by the Senator from 
Delaware [Mr. J. M. Clayton], in the course of his 
speech to-day. The vote of the preceding session, 
he believed, was almost, if not altogether, unanimous. 
It was the first of a series of bills passed at that 
time, and passed speedily. He admitted that he 
voted for that bill ; he voted for it under the circum- 
stances in which it was presented to the Senate. 
They were officially advised that our army had been 
ordered by the President to march from the position 
it had occupied on the Nueces to the Rio Grande. 
This order was given by the President, the com- 
mander-in-chief, and the army was not at liberty to 
disobey. They were also informed that hostilities 
had been commenced between us and Mexico. At 
that time Greneral Taylor had under his command 
certainly not exceeding three thousand men — his im- 
pression was that General Taylor had not more than 
two thousand five hundred men. They were informed 

(389) 



390 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

at the same time, in the same document, which came 
to them from the President — if it were not so, he 
hoped he should be corrected — or through other 
channels, that the Mexican force amounted to eight 
thousand men — some statements made it a force 
of twelve thousand men — which was hoverino- about 
our little army with the avowed determination to 
exterminate them. Under these circumstances, the 
President of the United States asked for men and 
money — not for the prosecution of a war of invasion 
into the heart of Mexico — not for the avowed pur- 
pose of taking possession of her towns — still less, as 
he w^as reminded by the Senator from Georgia [Mr. 
Berrien], to dismember the Mexican republic, seizing 
a province here and another there, and holding them 
by right of conquest, that they may serve as security 
and indemnity for the almost boundless expense of 
this war. He at that time voted for that bill, as he 
understood every Senator on this side of the chamber 
did except tw^o, not with a view to make war on 
Mexico, but for the rescue of our little army from 
its perilous position. The Senator from Delaware 
had this day reminded him of that vote, and by 
implication reproached him with apparent incon- 
sistency. 

[Mr. Clayton remarked, "Not at all. The Senator has per- 
fectly justified his vote."] 

Well, then, the Senator from Delaware had 
taken it unkind in him that, to quote that Sena- 
tor's own eloquent language, he had hung his 



ON THE "three MILLIOX BILL." 391 

harp upon the willow that day when his own and the 
harp of his friend from Kentucky [Mr. Crittenden]] 
were strung to such mellifluous tones. Mr. Corwin 
remembered well that he was silent on that occasion, 
and he should have been silent up to this hour, if it 
had not been that he was now placed in a different 
position, and he was anxious to vindicate that posi- 
tion. Why should he have spoken ? Delighted as 
he was then, and on all occasions, to listen to the 
harpings of his friends from Delaware and Kentucky, 
he knew his own music w^ould have fallen upon deaf 
ears. Those Senators had w^aked. up tones of deep 
supplication, and what followed? Why, after they 
had strung their harps to notes of w^oe, they sat 
down to weep. Mr. Corwin had not thought it 
necessary to tune his harp on that day, and he did 
not now regret it. He, however, voted to give men 
and money for the purposes he had expressed, and 
what were they now told by the Executive message ? 
That when the demand w^as made on Congress for 
these supplies, it was for the pur230se of making a 
systematic invasion of Mexico, to dismember her ter- 
ritory, and holding it by force until she would accept 
such terms as it pleases her conqueror to prescribe. 
But those terms were not made known to him. 
They were not advised what they will be, and the 
Mexicans \Vere to be left altogether to Executive 
mercy. Under these circumstances, he thought an 
extreme case was presented — a case which he found 
Senators on his side of the chamber willing to say 
may arise, which might justify them in withholding 



392 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

the supplies. He had acted upon his convictions of 
duty in the case, as it was presented to him ; but it 
never entered into his heart or his head to cast 
censure on those honorable Senators who differed 
from him. It was a long time, and after painful 
reflection, that he brought himself to consent to give 
a vote different from the vote of those respected 
Senators around him, to whom he looked as his 
instructors and guides. He had risen merely to set 
himself right, and having done so, he should resume 
his seat. 



OJN" THE TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT OF 
OREGON— COMPROMISE BILL. 

[In the course of the protracted debate in the United States 
Senate, upon the bill to establish the Territorial Government of 
Oregon, Mr. Clayton of Delaware, on the 12th July, 1848, 
moved that a committee of eight Senators — four from the North- 
ern, and four from the Southern sections of the Union — be 
appointed by ballot, to whom the subject should be referred. 
This motion prevailed; and the committee on Territories was 
discharged from the further consideration of so much of the Pres- 
ident's Message, as related to New Mexico and California, and the 
same referred to the said committee of eight. 

Pending the preliminary debate upon this motion, in reply to 
an inquiry of Mr. Corwin's, the Senators of South Carolina 
(Mr. Butler and Mr. Calhoun), denounced the decision of the 
Supreme Court of the United States, in the case of the State of 
Pennsylvania, vs. Prigg, so far as the Court held that all State 
legislation of that character, whether intended to retard or facilitate 
the owner in the apprehension of his fugitive slave, was unconstitu- 
tional. But the former of these Senators (Mr. Butler), agreed 
with the Chief Justice, and two of the associates upon that case, 
who, he said, held that the non-slaveholding States " could pass 
no laws to prohibit the owner from exercising his constitutional 
rights in reclaiming his runaway slave ; but that they might make 
such laws as would facilitate the delivery, which the obligation of 
good faith would demand at their hands." Mr. Corwin said]: 

I am perfectly satisfied that the Senator stated 

the decision as recorded in our books. It is enouo'h 

to say that a majority of the bench have decided the 

question which I proj)osed. 

[Mr. Calhoun — I do not recognize the decision]. 

(393) 



394 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX, 

I Avill not undertake to say, from a very accurate 
criticism of the case, whether the point now suggested 
was brought up directly before the court; but it was 
discussed before it, as one of the questions necessary 
to arrive at the decisions on the main point; and 
being discussed by the counsel on both sides, the 
question was as fully decided by the court as any 
other brought before them. In regard to the legisla- 
tion of the States, I am not prepared to say whether 
the gentleman from South Carolina is fully correct 
in the statement of his views. But I think the 
gentlemen from the South have allowed their sensi- 
bilities to be quite too much excited on this subject. 
With regard to the transactions referred to in Ken- 
tucky, there has been a great mistake as to the facts. 
Commissioners were sent on behalf of the State of 
Kentucky to the State of Ohio, for the purpose of 
negotiating a treaty of extradition, as the gentleman 
from South Carolina calls it; and I have only to say, 
that we did not imprison them nor send them home. 
We allowed them to remain at our court, where, 
with the help of the imperial parliament of Ohio, a 
law was enacted perfectly satisfactory to both sides, 
and almost in terms the same as the law of Pennsyl- 
vania, which was decided upon by the Supreme 
Court of the United States. That law was repealed 
by the legislature of the State of Ohio, for the simple 
reason that the highest judicial tribunal in the 
United States had decided that they had no constitu- 
tional power to pass it. Now, if these States lying 
within that district of country spoken of as included 



TERRITOEIAL GOVERNMENT OF OREGON. 395 

in the ordinance of 1787, are denounced for not 
complying, as is supposed, with the terms of that 
ordinance, when it is shown that they have legislated 
exactly according to the prescription of that only 
tribunal who can interpret judicially the Constitution 
of the United States, all I can say is, that the charge 
falls harmless at our feet, and that all Christendom, 
in all time to come, will absolve us of it. 

[Mr. Butler. — I Lope the gentleman will inform us whether 
that extraordinary embassy from Kentucky to the " imperial 
court" of OhiOj was not occasioned by the intolerable mischiefs 
which the people of Kentucky suffered from the escaping of their 
slaves into Ohio, beyond the reach of reclamation?] 

I will answer the Senator with great pleasure. 
The embassy originated in the solicitude of our sister 
State of Kentucky to preserve amicable relations with 
us. The reason assigned by the embassy was, that 
our law did not furnish to them the means of reclaim- 
ing their fugitive slaves. The people of the United 
States had acted upon the subject in the law of 1793; 
but it seems that they did not act with that degree 
of efficiency necessary, in the judgment of the people 
of Kentucky, to secure to them their property. There 
was another reason which induced the State of Ohio 
to entertain that negotiation, and to enact this law. 
The people of Ohio were just as solicitous as their 
fellow-citizens of Kentucky to have a statute on that 
subject, or at least embracing many of the cases sup- 
posed in Kentucky to fall within the law. There 
were, I believe, a few felons in Kentucky — for there 
is, I believe, a penitentiary there — and occasionally 



396 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

it contained individuals supposed to have committed 
crimes. Some of them, finding it inconvenient to 
execute their purposes in Kentucky, were in the habit 
of coming over to Ohio for the purpose of kidnapping- 
negroes. Occasionally, a gentleman would be killed 
in this amiable pursuit; and the apology was, that 
they had come to reclaim fugitive slaves. If this 
statement were false, no harm was done; if true, the 
man who shot him was punished as a murderer, 
under the law of Ohio. It was, therefore, very desi- 
rable on both sides, as well to protect Kentucky in 
claiming her slaves as to prevent Kentuckians from 
coming over to kidnap — a very common practice in 
all States bordering on slave States, with which we 
were greatly troubled, the expense from peniten- 
tiai-ies being very considerably augmented from that 
very source — that the question should be settled. 

[Mr. Calhoun. — I can not permit the Senator to escape even 
under a decision of the Supreme Court. By express contract 
between the rest of the States and the people inhabiting these 
territories, which are now States, the latter bound themselves to 
deliver up our fugitive slaves. They are the parties to that con- 
tract, under the ordinance, and it has not been superseded by 
the Constitution.] 

Have not the Supreme Court, to which reference 
has been made, interpreted our rights, duties, and 
powers, under that compact? 

[Mr. Calhoun. — Simply and only under the Constitution of 
the United States. They could not put aside a contract. It stands 
upon higher principles. It stands entirely on different ground 
from the case in Pennsylvania. The decision has not been con- 



TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT OF OREGON. 397 

firmed, and I trust never will be. I have always considered it 
as the most extraordinary decision ever made. But I put that 
aside, and present the positive contract between these parties. 
There was no United States Government then to fulfill it. The 
old Congress had no such power. There stands the contract, 
and will ever stand, around which it is impossible to go.] 

I have only one remark in reply to the Senator's 
view of our obligations under the Ordinance. When 
the Supreme Court decided that, under the Constitu- 
tion, made subsequently to that Ordinance, these 
States had no power to pass such laws, unquestion- 
ably they have given a judicial interpretation to 
their rights, power, and duties under the Ordinance 
as well as under the Constitution. The truth is, 
that the Ordinance and the Constitution are in the 
very same words. Whatever obligations there may 
be under the Ordinance of 1787 remain under the 
Constitution, and are reimposed by that instrument. 
Now, it must be seen, that the decision of the 
Supreme Court comprehends every obligation under 
which the State of Ohio or any north-western State 
has been placed by virtue of that Ordinance. Surely 
if that compact, in the judgment of the Supreme 
Court, had had an obligation above the Constitution 
and beyond it, they would have said so. It is true 
that the case was one from Pennsylvania, but much 
of the discussion, as every gentleman Avho attended 
to it at that time knows, was upon this very Ordi- 
nance. But that is immaterial. If the obligations 
under the Constitution of the United States, which 
the State of Ohio or any other State of the jN'orth- 



398 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIN. 

western Territory owes to the South, as it is called, 
exists by virtue of the Constitution of the United 
States, they are not tolerated in legislating upon the 
subject. 

[Mr. Calhoun. — I can not permit even that view of the case 
to pass. The Constitution expressly provides for the continuance 
of this contract between the United States and the people that 
inhabited the North-west Territory. The sixth article of the 
Constitution contains an express permission that "all debts con- 
tracted, and engagements entered into before the adoption of this 
Constitution shall be as valid against the United States under 
this Constitution as under the Confederation." Now, is it not 
manifest that the Ordinance of 1787 looked to its fulfillment 
under the present Government, and not the old Confederation, 
which had no machinery, no capacity to execute it? If the 
words of the Ordinance and those in the Constitution are precisely 
the same — and I have not compared them — it is one of the strong- 
est arguments to show that the decision of the court was wrong, 
and that the words of the Constitution ought to have received 
the interpretation of the prior words, instead of the prior words 
receiving the interpretation of the latter.] 

I do not intend to controvert the right of the gen- 
tleman to take an appeal from the decision of the 
Supreme Court, but I do not know where he can find 
any revisory power at present. 

[Again, on the 18th, 19th, and 22d of July, the same subject 
was debated — on the last named date Mr. Hale was about to 
address the Senate, but yielded to Mr. CoRWix, who said] : 

I wish to submit to any member of the committee 
one or two questions to which it is very desirable to 
myself, and I dare say to many others, that a reply 
should be given before we are called upon to vote on 



TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT OF OREGON. 399 

this bill. The bill, with what propriety I will not 
undertake to say, has been described by the honor- 
able chairman of the committee, as a Compromise 
Bill. It will be in the recollection of every Senator, 
that during the discussion upon the Oregon bill, which 
gave rise to the proposition that laws should be made 
for all these Territories together, there was one point 
of law discussed by several gentlemen on both sides 
of the Chamber. The honorable Senator from South 
Carolina, if I did not misunderstand him, main- 
tained, that by the Constitution of the United States 
it was incompetent for Congress to enact that Slavery 
should not exist in the Territories ; and that it was 
equally incompetent for any territorial government 
of any sort that might be erected there to make such 
a law. I understood my honorable friend from Geor- 
gia on my left [Mr. Berrien] to maintain the same 
proposition, in the same identical terms. Now, I 
suj)posed, that after that discussion, when the whole 
question had been submitted to this committee, con- 
stituted chiefly of gentlemen learned in the law, they 
must have revolved in their minds and discussed in 
their retirement this fundamental proposition, lying 
at the bottom of all our action. I did expect^ — ^though 
perhaps I was wrong in entertaining that anticipa- 
tion — ^that we should have had a detailed report from 
that committee, resolving that radical question for 
the benefit of Senators who might not be able, in 
consequence of their not being learned in the law, to 
give to the proposition that degree of attention which 
it deserved. If it be true, as was maintained by my 



400 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

friend from Georgia — for whose legal acquirements I 
entertain so much respect that I can scarcely trust 
myself to differ from him — that Congress can make 
no such law, why, then, I presume that the objection 
urged by the Senator from Connecticut, on the other 
side of the Chamber, falls to the ground. I rise, 
then, for the purpose of asking of the learned gentle- 
men who were occupied so assiduously for some days 
in the examination of this important question, and 
who must have known, before they retired, that if 
this grand obstacle could be removed, we should 
have no ditficulty at all in passing such a bill, whether 
they made any investigation on that point ? and if 
so, whether they are at liberty to disclose the result 
of it to the Senate ? 

Again : I wish to be informed from these gentle- 
men learned in the law — for I have not turned my 
attention to the particular statutory provisions on 
this point— how it is that an appeal and writ of error 
shall lie from the superior judicial tribunal estab- 
lished in the Territories to the Supreme Court of the 
United States? The gentlemen of the committee 
having, as I supposed, very seduously directed their 
attention to the subject w^hich divides us here — the 
subject of slavery — I wish to know whether, when 
this law comes to be put in operation, the committee 
have found with certainty that the question of slavery, 
as it is usually brought up in courts, can be brought 
by a writ of error before the Supreme Court of the 
United States, w^ithout some specific legislation ? For 
instance : I believe that in the law which regulates 



TERRITORIAL GOVERNMENT OF OREGON. 401 

writs of error and appeals from the circuit courts of 
the United States to the Supreme Court, it is pro- 
vided that the value of the thing in controversy must 
be at least two thousand dollars, exclusive of costs, I 
have been told, informally, that the provision in this 
bill, allowing writs of error and appeal, was made to 
satisfy any gentleman that it was the intention of the 
committee to withdraw this controversy about the 
power of Congress to make laws for the Territories 
from the Congress of the United States — to withdraw 
this constitutional question, in other words, from 
Congress, and submit it to the judicial tribunals of 
the country. Now, if that be so, and if that would 
be the effect of the bill in case it were enacted, I wish 
to know, if a man go into one of these Territories 
with a slave, whether the object of the bill is to raise 
the question whether that sort of property, without 
law, can be carried into a Territory where there 
is no law, and if so, how it is to be carried into 
effect ? Under the existing law, I suppose the slave 
would ask a writ of habeas corpus, and require his 
master to produce him in court, and show the cause 
of his capture and detention before one of these terri- 
torial judges. The territorial judge, according to 
this bill, is to be appointed by the present Chief 
Magistrate of the United States — a fact which I beg- 
to mention for the information of gentlemen north of 
Mason and Dixon's line. This judge will decide, if 
he believe the constitutional law to be as the gentle- 
men from South Carolina and Georgia maintain, that 
the master has a right to the services of the slave, 
26 



402 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

who will be accordingly remanded into the service 
of his master. That is the way in which the case 
elaborates itself into a judgment, and how it is 
proposed to bring it before the Supreme Court of the 
United States, so that it may be decided by the 
highest judicial tribunal in America, How is it to 
come here ? Is the property in controversy of the 
value of two thousand dollars ? What is the value of 
a slave? My learned friend from Georgia smiles. 
Perhaps I may not be so familiar as he is with the 
value of that kind of property. But if he can listen 
to me with the gravity which I think the subject 
demands 

[Mr. Berrien (in his seat). The gentleman is entirely mis- 
taken.] 

I withdraw the remark. How is the value of a 
slave to be ascertained ? We are told that there is 
no property in the man, but simply a claim to his 
services. What, then, is the value of his services? 
It may be more or less, according to the judgment 
of men; but very few slaves, I believe, sell for a 
thousand dollars. If, then, the value of the slave do* 
not reach two thousand dollars, his fate is decided by 
this judge appointed by the President of the United 
States, who sits in his court fifteen hundred miles 
from Washington City. This is the final judgment. 

I may be wrong in all this. But certainly, as the 
law now stands, if such a case come within the cate- 
gory of the bill before us, I have difficulty in perceiv- 
ing how it can be brought here. I say nothing now 
of the great advantages that will accrue to the 



TERRITORIAL GOYERXMEXT OF OREGOX. 403 

slave population which may be carried there, in con- 
sequence of their having such an easy and facile 
method of bringing their case before the Supreme 
Court ; nor of the perfect equality between them and 
their master, as respects the giving of the requisite 
security for costs ; nor of the ease with which they 
can attend the Supreme Court of the United States, 
after a journey of fifteen hundred miles during the 
winter, to hear the decision of that tribunal as to 
whether Cuffee or his master is right in the matter ! 
But it does seem to me that there is here an anom- 
aly worth looking at about the noon of the nineteenth 
century. I do not rise, however, to discuss the ques- 
tion, but simply to ask the learned gentleman from 
Vermont, or any other gentleman, who has given 
attention to this legal question, to favor me with a 
reply to those interrogatories which I have now 
respectfully submitted. I should also be very haj^py 
to be informed as to the amount of population in 
Upper California, and in that described in this bill 
as JSTew Mexico. I believe we have pretty accurate 
statistics in relation to the population of Oregon. 
But I am somewhat at a loss to know why a distinc- 
tion has been made between Oregon and the terri- 
tories of California and New Mexico. I should be 
very happy to know why the people of Oregon have 
been regarded as capable of making their own laws, 
while the people of California and 'New Mexico have 
been deemed incapable. 

[Mr. Clayton. — The committee thought, in view of all the facts, 
that the people of California and New Mexico were not now in 



404 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

that state wliicli fitted them to elect a delegate to Congress, or a 
territorial legislature. The gentleman, as a north-western man, 
knows that many of our territories, in the first instance, had just 
such a form of government extended over them as is proposed in 
this bill for California and New Mexico. The next stage of terri- 
torial organization we have given to Oregon, and I think my 
friend from Ohio must admit that the character of the population 
of New Mexico renders them utterly unfit for self-government.] 

Will the Senator from Delaware allow me to ask 
another question ? Why does he consider the people 
of jN^ew Mexico unfit for self-government ? 

[Mr. Clayton. — They are entirely too ignorant, and the gentle- 
man probably knows that as well as I do.] 



[On the 24th July, 1848, Mr. Corwin addressed the Senate at 
length upon the Compromise Bill reported by Mr. Clayton from 
the Committee of Eight. Mr. Corwin said :] 

Mr. President: 
I should scarcely undertake to assign to the Senate 
a reason for prolonging this debate, especially after 
the Very elaborate and lucid exposition of the bill 
now before us, which has been given by the Senator 
from Yermont; I feel compelled, however, from 
various considerations, with which I will not trouble 
the Senate, to state, in very few words, if that be 
possible, what my objections are to the passage of 
the bill ; and, it may be, to offer some few observa- 
tions in reply to such propositions as have been 
announced at various times during this debate, by 
Senators on the other side of the Chamber. I have 
listened with great eagerness, since the commence- 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 405 

ment of this discussion, to everything that has been 
said, with the most sincere and unfeigned desire to 
make myself acquainted with at least the primary 
elements and principles which enter into the compo- 
sition of the bill. And, I think I may say, without 
exposing myself to the charge of egotism, that I feel 
as little the influences which have been spoken of by 
the Senator from Vermont as it is desirable that any 
gentleman, acting in the capacity of a legislator, 
should feel. I do not participate, however, I may 
advertise gentlemen, in the belief which has been so 
constantly expressed during this discussion, that this 
is a subject which is likely to produce that terrible 
and momentous excitement that is spoken of. I 
believe if this principle were discussed solemnly, 
and, so to speak, abstractedly from those extraneous 
circumstances too frequently adverted to here, that 
we should be much more likely to arrive at a satis- 
factory conclusion to ourselves, and at more satisfac- 
tory results, I hope, to those who are to come after 
us. I have no belief that the passage of a law, such 
as is now before the Senate, will produce a disruption 
of the bonds that hold this Union together. I have 
no belief that the passage of the law so much depre- 
cated by some gentlemen on this side, by the name, 
if you please, of the " Wilmot Proviso," could, by any 
possibility whatever, induce the Southern portion of 
the Union, which, we are told, is so much excited on 
the subject, to tear themselves asunder from the Con- 
stitutional compact by which we are all held together. 
Sir, if I entertained an opinion of this kind, I should 



406 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWUs". 

scarcely think a seat on this floor worth possessing 
for a single clay. I do not think the technical term 
spoken of by the Senator fi'om Vermont, the " Wil- 
mot Proviso," can of itself exercise that influence 
upon statesmen of exalted intellect of the South, 
which has been intimated by gentlemen who have 
participated in this debate. What is this terrible 
Wilmot Proviso, that has been erected here and 
elsewhere into such a raw head and bloody-bones, to 
use a very expressive phrase of the nursery ? What 
is it ? Why, sir, there are about me Senators who 
know very well to whom the paternity of the "Wil- 
mot Proviso," as it has been recently baptized, 
belonged. They know that the same gentleman 
who drafted the Declaration of Independence, which 
is hung up in our halls and placed in our libraries, 
and regarded Avith the same reverence as our Bible — 
for it has become a Gospel of Freedom all over the 
world as well as in this country — drafted that which 
is called the "Wilmot Proviso," composing, as it did, 
a section of the Ordinance of 1787, and that the hand 
that drafted both was Jefferson's. There have been 
some strange misnomers in regard to acts, some 
strange confusion of nomenclature in this country, as 
in this case, when a part of the Ordinance of 1787 
has come to bear the appellation of the "Wilmot 
Proviso." Sir, much as I respect that gentleman for 
his position upon this subject, which has connected 
his very name with the Ordinance of 1787, I deny to 
him the honor of originating it. It is a piracy of the 
copyright. I do not see that there is any danger 



ON THE COMPEOMISE BILL. 407 

that Southern gentlemen, after the lapse of so many 
years, and after the founding of a young empire in 
the West, by virtue of that Ordinance, will so dese- 
crate the memory of Jefferson and spit on his grave, 
because we merely re-enact that Ordinance over a 
Territory which has subsequently come into our pos- 
session. I have no idea that such consequences will 
follow from the passage of such a law, as gentlemen 
have predicted. There must have been a strange 
revolution wrought in the minds of Southern gentle- 
men between 1787 and 1847, if such consequences 
are to follow. And I could not help observing while 
the Senator from Vermont was expressing these noble 
sentiments, which everybody, even those who do not 
feel them, must admire, telling us we should act here 
independently of the excitement without these walls, 
and that we should scorn those newspaper para- 
graphs in which we are vilified, written by those 
who know little of the motives by which we are influ- 
enced, and who care less ; I could not help observing 
that at last the Senator admonished us that there 
was an excitement abroad which we must allay ; and 
to do that, he agreed to this bill, although it was 
somewhat different from that which he desired — 
so that the lion-hearted Senator from Vermont has 
agreed to this Compromise, as it is called, because 
there is an excitement which he wishes to allay by 
it. Sir, I desire to see gentlemen act and vote here 
as if there were no excitement on the subject. I 
should be very sorry, at least to allow any influences 
to operate upon my deliberate judgment, except those 



403 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

which belong to the rehition of representative and 
constituent. It is the farthest from my intention of 
anything that can be conceived of to say anything in 
regard to this bill which may wound the feelings of 
gentlemen who have labored so hard to produce 
something that would satisfy us all. The Senator 
from Vermont has acted as he should have acted, 
has acted nobly in relation to this matter, and I 
know very well that he will be willing to accord to 
me the same rule of action, the same independence 
that he has used ; and I fear, when I come to speak 
of the bill, I shall be under the necessity of availing 
myself of what the gentleman has called a " special 
demurrer;" for I do not think there is such pressing 
necessity for the passage of the bill, as to oblige us to 
forego the statement of such objections as we may 
entertain. Suppose you enact no law, what will 
happen ? Oregon has for many years taken care of 
herself, and I believe, on one or two occasions, made 
better laws for herself than she is likely to get at our 
hands. She has taken care of herself ever since she 
became an integral portion of the Union, by the set- 
tlement of the dispute between us and Great Britain. 
How the new provinces may fare, what may happen 
to New Mexico and California in the intermediate 
time which will elapse, if we should not be able to 
act upon this matter at the present session, is not a 
matter of much concern or apprehension with me, 
because I know they have been in your custody for a 
year or two, and have not complained at all for the 
want of legal enactments ; they have only complained 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 409 

that you have made too free use of gunpowder. 
Rather than not act in the matter fully and defi- 
nitely, as I would if there were no emergency, I 
would allow those provinces to take care of them- 
selves for another twelvemonths, and come here at 
the beginning of a new session, ready to act upon 
the subject as my judgment should dictate. 

Now, sir, in the first place, I understand we have a 
message from the President, although I believe it 
has not been adverted to by any one, calling upon us 
to designate the boundaries of these territories of 
J^ew Mexico and California; and another branch 
of the Legislature has been anxiously looking to the 
geography of those countries, and tracing their his- 
tory, and are as yet incapable of determining where 
Texas ends and 'New Mexico begins; and they have 
been under the necessity of applying to the chief 
magistrate to give them a lesson in geography. 
What the substance of the information they have 
received was I do not know, but I have been in- 
formed, upon the floor of the Senate, that Texas 
extends to the banks of the Rio Grande. 

If this be so, I must be permitted to look to the 
gentlemen of the committee for information as to how 
much is left for New Mexico, what extent of territory, 
and what amount of population ? Is it worth while 
to establish a Territorial Government there, if it be 
true that Texas extends to the Rio Grande? I 
think it will be found that there will be but a frag- 
ment of New Mexico left, so far as population is 
concerned. It will be very convenient, perhaps, to 



410 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

attach it to the Government of California. If you 
send your Governors and other officers there without 
establishing the boundaries, there will be a conflict 
of territorial jurisdiction. Is it not expedient to 
settle it now, when you are founding new Govern- 
ments there, and placing side by side institutions 
which may be very dissimilar ? It is perfectly cer- 
tain that Texas will extend her laws to the Rio 
Grande ; and if she does, she will comprehend within 
her jurisdiction a large j)roportion of the population 
of what was formerly N^ew Mexico. Here, then, is 
my special demurrer. Under other circumstances, 
I am sure the Senator from Vermont would agree 
with me that it is indispensable to the Governments 
which we are about to establish, that the limits of 
their jurisdiction should be defined, although I do 
not know that this would be an insuperable ol^jection 
with me, if the other portions of the bill were such 
as I could give my assent to. 

And now I intend, in a few words, to state why I 
object to this Compromise bill. Sir, there is no one 
— there can be no one — who does not desire that 
every subject of legislation which comes before the 
Senate should be settled harmoniously, and, if it 
might be so, with the unanimous concurrence of 
every Senator. But, sir, in my judgment, with this 
subject as it stands before us, it would be arrogant 
presumption to undertake to vote upon this bill, with 
a question before us which we undertake to transfer 
to the Judiciary department of the country. How is 
this? Is it not a new thing in your legislation, when 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 411 

a system of i^olicy is proposed, and the constitutional 
propriety of that policy is questioned, to pass an act 
for the purpose of getting a case before the Supreme 
Court, that that Court may instruct the Senate of the 
United States as to constitutional duty in the matter? 
Sii', if we know certainly what that law will be, need 
tliere be any hesitancy how we shall vote upon this 
bill? Can any one suppose that the Senator from 
Georgia, or the Senator from South Carolina, if they 
believed that the litigation that is proposed by this 
bill to be brought into the Judicial tribunals of the 
country would result contrary to their determination 
of what the law should be, that they would be in 
favor of such a bill as this? Does any one believe 
that if the Senator from Vermont could anticipate 
that the Supreme Court of the United States might 
decide that Congress, being silent upon the subject, 
had allowed slavery to pass, at its pleasure, into 
these newly-acquired territories, and to become part 
of the municipal institutions of these territories, and 
to decide, also, that if Congress had enacted a pro- 
hibitory law, it could not have gone there, he would 
vote for this bill? Certainly he would not. Is there 
any necessity that there should be a prohibitory law 
passed, in order that the question of slavery should 
be presented with the aid of Congressional legisla- 
tion to the Supreme Court of the United States? I 
will not undertake to say that I differ with the 
Senator from Vermont in a single legal proposition 
that he has laid down. I regard slavery as a local 
institution. I believe it rests on that basis, as the 



412 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

only one that can give it a moment's security. I 
believe it can not be carried, by the power of the 
master over his servant, one inch beyond the territo- 
rial limits of the power that makes the law. I 
believe that a slave carried by his master into the 
territory about which we are talking, if slavery be 
abolished there, will be free from the moment he 
enters the territory, and any attempt to exercise 
2:>ower over him as a slave will be nugatory. That 
is my judgment. But I would guard against any 
doubt on this subject. I would so act that there 
should be nothing left undone on my part to prevent 
the admission of slaves, for I am free to declare that 
if you were to acquire the country that lies under the 
line, the hottest country to be found on the globe, 
where the white man is supposed not to be able to 
work, I would not allow you to take slaves there, if 
slavery did not exist there already. More than 
that, I would abolish it if I could, if it did exist. 
These are my opinions, and they always have been 
the same. I know they were the opinions of Wash- 
ington up to the hour of his death; and they were 
the opinions of Jeflferson and of others, who, in the 
infancy of the institution, saw and deplored its e^ils, 
and deprecated its continuance, and would have taxed 
themselves to the utmost to exterminate it then. 
I possess no opinion on the subject that I have not 
derived from these sources. 

I have only to say, that these opinions have always 
received the concurrence of my own understanding, 
and this after the most careful investigation I have 



ox THE COMPEOMISE BILL. 413 

been able to give the subject. I find the institution 
of shivery existing in several States of the Union — 
it is a local, a State institution, existing under the 
guarantees of the Constitution. I find that, as a 
legislator of this N^ational Government, I am for- 
bidden by the Constitution to act upon this or any 
other merely State institution. I can not, therefore, 
interfere with slavery in the States as I can in a 
Territory^ where, as yet, no State sovereignty exists, 
and as I will there, and would everywhere else on 
the face of the earth, where I am not forbidden, and 
where my power might extend. And here, sir, I 
ask, what has been your practice as a Government 
on this subject? If at any time in your progress, 
since 1789, you have acquired territory where slavery 
existed in such form and consistency as to make it 
now difficult to overthrow it, it has been permitted, 
only permitted, to remain where by law it did exist ; 
as in the Worth-western Territory before 1789, but 
had not taken deep root, it was expelled ; and as in 
the Missouri Compromise, excluding it in all territory 
north of latitude 36° 30', after 1789. 

When Louisiana was acquired, such was the tone 
of public opinion then against slavery, that I am 
sure the men of that day would have abolished it 
there, but for the supposed evil of displacing a system 
long-established, on which and by which the social 
and political systems of the country were necessarily 
formed. Perhaps, also, the terms of the treaty were 
with some an obstacle. The same men who directed 
public opinion in 1787, in a great measure controlled 



414 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

it in 1804. Jefferson, who was the author of the 
Ordinance of 1787, was President in 1804, when 
Louisiana was acquired. By his influence, the Ordi- 
nance of 1787 made five free States in the north- 
west, and I doubt not Louisiana woukl have been 
also freed from slavery too, but for the reasons I 
have assigned. Such were the views of men who 
directed public opinion then ; would to God they, or 
such as they, had more to do with public opinion now. 

When the ample patrimony of Virginia was trans- 
ferred to the Confederacy, Jeiferson, and those of 
his school, who made this noble donation, at once 
declared that slavery should not pollute the soil of 
five rich and powerful new States. Such was Vir- 
ginian, such was American opinion then. I can not 
suppose the opinions of these men were so changed 
between 1787 and 1804, that slaver}^, at the latter 
period, would be spared by them, except for the 
reasons I have assigned already. Liberty, perfect 
freedom to all men, of all colors and nations, was 
the doctrine of Jefferson then, and I am told he is 
now the authoritative expounder o-f free principles 
to the school calling itself "Virginian" as w^ell as 
" Democratic." 

Why, there is scarcely a Virginian who ventures 
to have an opinion contrary to the lightest thought 
that he ever expressed. And is it so, that we are 
now to be required, for the sake of some imaginary 
balance of power, to carry slavery into a country 
where it does not now exist? That, sir, is the 
question propounded by this bill. The Senator from 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 415 

Vermont is satisfied that slavery can not be extended 
to these Territories. I believe, if his confidence in 
the judicial tribunals of the country were well founded, 
that slavery could not possibly go into these Terri- 
tories, provided the Senate is right both as to law 
and the facts„ I ask every member of the Senate — 
perhaps I may be less informed than any — whether 
slavery does not exist, by some Mexican law, at this 
hour, in California. 

[Mr. Hannegan (in his seat). — It does exist. Peon Slavery 
exists there.] 

I would thank the Senator from Indiana if he will 
inform me what Peon Slavery is ; and really I ask 
the question for the purpose of obtaining information. 
I desire to know its conditions. Is it transmissible 
by inheritance? Does the marvelous doctrine of 
which the honorable Senator from Virginia spoke, 
as being part and parcel of the law adopted in Vir- 
ginia — jjartus sequitur ventrem — prevail? Is that 
holy ordinance, that the offspring of the womb of 
her who is a slave must necessarily be slaves also, 
there recognized? 

[Mr. Hannegan. — As I understand, slavery exists in California 
and New Mexico, as it does throughout the Republic of Mexico, 
and is termed Peon Slavery — slavery for debt, by which the 
creditor has a right to hold the debtor, through all time, in a 
far more absolute bondage than that by which any Southern 
planter holds his slaves here.] 

So it has been described to me. I have not seen 
the Mexican laws upon the subject; but the state- 
ment just made agrees with that of many gentlemen 



416 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

who profess to know something on the subject, and 
therefore I am inclined to think that it is so, and 
that these people are the subjects of that infernal 
law. The Senator from Delaware, the other day, 
informed us that the committee have not given to 
the people of California and New Mexico the right 
of suffrage, because they were incapable of exer- 
' cising it — ^because a large portion of them were of 
the colored races. Now, supposing that to be the 
case, and supposing the ^proposition to be submitted 
to the Supreme Court of the United States — was 
slavery an institution of New Mexico? — what would 
be the answer ? If the Senator from Indiana were 
there to make response, he would reply in the affirma- 
tive ; he would say that the institution of slavery 
was there ; that, to be sure, it had its modifications 
and its peculiarities, but that it was still slavery, 
though there might not have existed a law as strong 
as that glorious principle of free government spoken 
of by the Senator from Virginia — jpartus sequitur 
ventrem. If, sir, these three Latin words can con- 
demn to everlasting slavery the posterity of a woman 
who is a slave, may not that municipal regulation 
of which we are now speaking in California and 
New Mexico, with equal propriety, be denominated 
slavery? I find, then, slavery, as it is called, ex- 
isting here to a degree, and to all practical purj)oses, 
as lasting and inexorable as in the State of Virginia; 
and, therefore, the whole of the hypothesis of the 
gentleman from Vermont falls to the ground as a 
matter of fact, inasmuch as the Supreme Court will 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 417 

decide that slavery existed there, and that, there- 
fore, the whole slave population of the United States 
may be transferred to that country. 

[Mr. Phelps. — The gentleman will excuse me — I spoke of 
African Slavery.] 

Of that I am aware. I speak now of the general 
proposition. JN'ow, this is a very curious spectacle 
presented this day and for weeks past in the Ameri- 
can Congress, and one can not help pausing at this 
point, and reflecting upon the events of the last few^ 
years. On looking back at wdiat has happened to 
that period, I am sure that the magnanimous spirit 
of the Senator from South Carolina himself will be 
obliged to concede to the Northern States at least 
some apology for the slight degree of excitement on 
this subject. His hypothesis is, that to every portion 
of this newly-acquired territory — California not ex- 
cepted — every slaveholder in the United States has a 
right to migrate to-morrow, and carry with him his 
slaves — holding them there forever, subject only to 
the abolition of slavery wdien these Territories shall 
be made into States, and come into the Union. 
What, then, would be those few chapters in our 
history? We find ourselves now in the possession 
of Territories with a population of one hundred and 
fifty thousand souls, if I am correctly informed, in 
California and 'New Mexico. The best authenticated 
history of the social institutions of that population 
informs us that there exists there, at this moment, a 
27 



418 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

species of slavery as absolute and inexorable as exists 
anywhere on the face of the earth ; and that about 
five in six of the population of that country are 
subjected to the iron rule of this abominable insti- 
tution there. 

Now, I do not expect that any man will rise up 
and say, that because an individual happens to be 
the debtor of another, he shall have his own person 
sold into slavery; and not only that, but that the 
curse shall extend — worse than that of the Hebrew, 
not to the third and fourth generation, but to the 
remotest posterity of that unfortunate man. JSTobody 
will pretend to rise up in defense of such a proposi- 
tion as that. Now, then, I will give over the criticism. 
Suppose there is a law in New Mexico which obliges 
a man to work all the days of his life for another, 
because he happens to owe him five dollars, by some 
means contrived by the creditor to keep him always 
his debtor. Do you intend that that law shall exist 
there for an hour? Well, you have made a law here, 
that your law-makers who are to go to New Mexico 
and California shall not touch the subject of slavery ; 
and if that which is designated, in the popular lan- 
guage of that country, slavery, exists there, do you 
indeed send abroad, as you promised to do, your 
missionary of liberty ? You went there ' with the 
sword, and made it red in the blood of these people ! 
WTiat did you tell them? "We come to give you 
freedom!" Instead of that, you enact in your code 
here — ^bloody as that of Draco — that there shall be 



ON THE COMPKOMISE BILL. 419 

judges and lawgivers over them, but that they shall 
make no law touching that slavery to which five out 
of six of them are subjected. 

Mr. President, this chapter in your history fur- 
nishes instructive matter for our consideration. It 
is a strange act in the great drama of what we call 
progress. I have looked upon it with some concern. 
I was one of those who predicted that this, or some- 
thing like this, would be the result of your Mexican 
war. I always believed, notwithstanding your denials 
here, that you made war upon Mexico for the purpose 
and with the intention of conquest. I ventured to 
predict just what we now see, that acquisition of 
territory would follow the war as its consequence, 
and its object was that and nothing else; and that 
this very question would arise, and arise here, to 
distract your councils, disunite your people, and 
threaten, as we are now told it does, that peace 
which you thought of so lightly when war was so 
wantonly waged against Mexico. It now seems your 
pretensions were all hypocritical from the beginning. 
You said your armed men went forth to her in the 
spirit of love. You pretended their mission was not 
conquest, but to set free the captive, to raise up the 
prostrate Peon of that country — and now what fol- 
lows? As soon as your arms have subdued the 
country, the gentle note of the dove is changed to 
the lion's roar. Instead of the proper blessing of 
peace to your conquered subjects, you propose to 
leave the chains of the Peon untouched, and now 
gravely contend that negro slavery shall be super- 



420 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

added to slavery for debt. This is your improve- 
ment, this your progress in Mexico. To exalt the 
miserable Peon, you give him the enslaved negro for 
association and example. Sir, this is indeed a spec- 
tacle worth noting, in this bright noon of the nine- 
teenth century. 

We proclaimed to the world we would take noth- 
ing by conquest. This was our solemn hypocritical 
declaration for two dark years, while our progress 
was marked by blood, while the march of your power 
was like another people of old, by clouds of smoke 
in the day, and fire by night. City after city fell 
beneath the assaults of your gallant army, and still 
you ceased not to declare you would take nothing by 
conquest. Now you say this territory was conquered, 
was acquired by the common Mood of. our common 
country. You trace back the consideration which 
you have paid for this country to the blood and the 
bones of the gallant men that you sent there to be 
sacrificed ; and pointing to the unburied corses of her 
sons who have fallen there, the South exclaims — 
" These, these constitute my title to carry my slaves 
to that land ! It was purchased by the blood of my 
sons." The aged j)arent, bereft of his children, and 
the widow with the family that remains, desire to go 
there to better their fortunes, if it may be, and point- 
ing to the graves of husband and children, exclaim, 
"There, there was the price paid for our proportion 
of this territory!" Is that true? If that could be 
made out — ^if you dare put that upon your record — 
if you can assert that you hold the country by the 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 421 

strong hand, then you have a right to go there with 
your slaves. If we of the JN'orth have united with 
you of the South in an expedition of piracy, and 
robbery, and murder, that oklest law known among 
men — " Honesty among thieves " — requires us to 
divide it with you equally. 

If, indeed, Mr. President, we have no other right 
than that which force gives us to these our new pos- 
sessions ; if, indeed, we have slaughtered fifty thou- 
sand of God's creatures only to subject to our power 
one hundred and fifty thousand of an alien, enslaved, 
and barbarous people, it is but a fitting finale to all 
this to rivet yet closer the chain of personal slavery 
upon the Mexican Peon, and people your possessions 
thus acquired by slaves. I repeat, that this right of 
conquest applied to territory, is the same — no other 
and no better than that by which originally one man 
could claim to hold another in slavery. It is but the 
right, if right it may be called, of the strongest — the 
law in both cases is simply the law of force. You 
march over a country, wrest it by war from its owner, 
and say to the vanquished jwssessor, this is now 
mine. I have seized your property ; I hold it by the 
law of force. And so originally the slave-dealer 
seized the negro in his African home, slaughtered 
in combat part of his family, bound the rest in 
chains, brought them here, and sold them. It is 
simply ]power, and not rigid, in both cases, that 
makes the claim. I repeat, it seems indeed fitting 
and in character, that the two should accompany 
each other 



422 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

As in the case of lands thus acquired, long posses- 
sion" and continued acquiescense ( in the judgments 
of men) ripen the claim into legal right, so in the 
case of legal slavery, the captive, originally held only 
by force, in time, by the law of men, and by the judg- 
ment of men, becomes 2jro])erty ! ! And we are told 
by the Senator from Virginia [Mr. Mason] that the 
posterity of such become property only through the 
magical influence of these words, Roman words : 
''''Partus sequitur ventreiii'^ — "The child follows the 
condition of its mother." Admirable — philosoph- 
ical — rational — Christian maxim ! ! ! If the mother 
be captured in war, it seems then the will of a just 
God, "whose tender mercies are over all his works," 
that her offsj^ring to the remotest time shall be 
doomed to slavery. What sublime morality ! what 
lovely justice combine to sanctify this article in that 
new decalogue of freedom which we say it is our des- 
tiny to give to the world, ^^ Partus sequitur ventremP'' 
Why, it is said to be '-^common law." Alas, Mr. 
President, it is but too ^^ common, ^^ as we see. This 
right of conquest over land is the same as that by 
which a man may hold another in bondage. You 
may make it into a law if you please ; you may enact 
that it may be so ; it may be convenient to do so ; 
after perpetrating the original sin, it may be well to 
do so. But the case is not altered ; the source of the 
right remains unchanged. What is the meaning of 
the old Roman word Scrvus'^ I profess no skill in 
philological learning, but I can very well conceive 
how somebody, looking into this thing, might under- 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 423 

stand what was the law in those days. Thvi man's 
life was saved when his enemy conquered him in 
battle. He became servus — the man preserved by 
his magnanimous foe; and perpetual slavery was 
then thought to be a boon preferable to death. That 
was the way in which slavery began. Has anybody 
found out on the face of the earth a man fool enough 
to give himself up to another, and beg him to make 
him his slave ? I do not know of one such instance 
under heaven. Yet it may be so. Still, I think that 
not one man of our complexion, of the Caucasian 
race, could be found quite willing to do that ! 

Thus far we have been brought after having fought 
for this country and conquered it. The solemn 
appeal is made to us — " Have we not mingled our 
blood with yours in acquiring this country?" But 
did we mingle our blood with yours for the purpose 
of wresting this country by force from this people ? 
That is the question. You did not say so six months 
ago. You dare not say so now ! You may say that it 
was purchased, as Louisiana or as Florida was, with 
the common treasure of the country ; and then we 
come to the discussion of another proposition : What 
right do you acquire to establish slavery there ? But 
I was about to ask of some gentleman — the Sen- 
ator from South Carolina, for instance — ^whose eye at 
a glance has comprehended the history of the world, 
what he supposes will be the impression abroad of 
our Mexican war, and these, our Mexican acquisi- 
tions, if we should give to them the direction which 
he desires ? I do not speak of the propriety of slave 



424 " SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

labor being carried anywhere. I will waive that 
question entirely. What is it of which the Senator 
from Vermont has told us this morning, and of which 
we have heard so much during the last three weeks ? 
And how will our history read by the side of that ? 
Every gale that floats across the Atlantic comes 
freighted Avith the death-groans of a king; every 
vessel that touches your shores, bears with her 
tidings that the captives of the Old World are at 
last becoming free — that they are seeking, through 
blood and slaughter — blindly and madly, it may 
be — but nevertheless resolutely — deliverance from 
the fetters that have held them in bondage. Who 
are they ? Almost the whole of Euroj^e. And it is 
only about a year ago, I believe, that the officer of 
the Turkish empire who holds sway in Tunis — one 
of the old slave markets of the world, whose prisons 
formerly received those of our people taken upon 
the high seas and made slaves to their captors — 
announced to the world that all should there be free. 
And, if I am not mistaken, it will be found that this 
magic line "vvhich the Senator from South Carolina 
believes has been drawn around the globe which 
we inhabit, with the view of separating Freedom 
and Slavery — 36° 30' — brings this very Tunis into 
that region in which some supposed, by ordinance 
of nature, men are to be held in bondage ! All 
over the world the air is vocal with the shouts of 
men made free. What does it all mean ? It means 
that they have been redeemed from ])oUtical servi- 
tude; and in God's name I ask, if it be a boon to 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 425 

mankind to be free from political servitude, must it 
not be accepted as a matter of some gratulation that 
they have been relieved from personal servitude — 
absolute subjection to the arbitrary power of others ? 
What do we say of them ? I am not speaking of the 
propriety of this thing ; it may be all wrong, and 
these poor fellows in Paris, who have stout hands 
and Avilling hearts, anxious to earn their bread, may 
be very unreasonable in fighting for it. It may be 
all wrong to cut off the head of a king, or send him 
across the Channel. It may be highly improper and 
foolish in Austria to send away Metternich, and say, 
" We will look into this business ourselves." Accord- 
ing to the doctrine preached in these halls — in free 
America — instead of sending shouts of gratulation 
across the water to these people, we should send 
to them groans and commiseration for their folly, 
calling on them to beware how they take this busi- 
ness into their own hands — informing them that 
universal liberty is a curse ; that as one man is born 
with a right to govern an empire, he and his poster- 
ity must continue to exercise that power, because in 
this case it is not exactly i)artus seqidtwr ventrem, but 
partus sequitur patrem — that is all the difference. 
The crown follows the father ! Under your law, the 
chain follows the mother ! 

"Sir, we may, we ought to remember, that it ivas 
law in this country in 1776, that kings had a right 
to rule us — did rule us. George III said then ^^partus 
sequitur pair em,'''' my son inherits my crown, "he 
follows the condition of the father," "he is born to be 



426 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWI?^. 

your ruler;" your fathers said, this is not true, this 
shall be law no longer. Let us look for a moment at 
the doings of that good old time, 1776. Then, sir, 
our fathers, being op^^ressed, lifted up their hands 
and appealed to the Grod of justice, the common 
Father of all men, to deliver them and their posterity 
from that law, which jiroclaimed that "kings were 
born to rule." They (the men of 1776), did not 
believe that one man was born "booted and spurred" 
to ride another. And if, as they said, no man was 
born to rule another, did it not follow, that no man 
could rightfully be born to serve another? Sir, in 
those days, Virginia and Virginia's sons, Washington 
and Jetferson, had as little respect for that maxim, 
partus sequitur ventrem, as for that other cognate 
dogma, "Kings are born to rule." I infer from our 
history, sir, that the men of that day were sincere 
men, earnest, honest men, that they meant what they 
said. From their declaration, ^^all men are born 
equally free," I infer that, in their judgments, no 
man, It/ the law of his nature, was born to be a slave; 
and, therefore, he ought not by any other law to be 
born a slave. I think this maxim of kings being 
born to rule, and others being born only to serve, are 
both of the same family, and ought to have gone down 
to the same place whence I imagine they came, long 
ago, together. I do not think that your partus sequitur 
ventrem had much quarter shown it at Yorktown on a 
certain day you may remember. I think that when 
the lion of England crawled in the dust, beneath >the 
talons of your eagles, and CornAvallis surrendered to 



ON THE COMPEOMISE BILL. 427 

George Washington, tliat maxim, that a man is born 
to rule, went down, not to be seen among us again for- 
ever; and I think that partus seqidtur ventrem, in the 
estiaiation of all sensible men, should have disap- 
peared along with it. So the men of that day 
thought. And we are thus brought to the j^roper 
interpretation of the language of those men which has 
been criticised by the Senator from South Carolina. 

Mr, President, it is worth while to inquire Vvdiat 
were the publicly expressed opinions of the leading- 
men and States, as to the policy of IN'egro Slavery, 
from the year 1774 up to the year 1787, and from 
thence up to the final adoption of the Constitution, in 
1789. And, first, how was it in the old common- 
wealth, Virginia ? 

" June^ 1774. — At a general meeting of the freeholders and 
inhabitants of Prince George's county, Virginia, the following 
resolves were unanimously agreed to (among others) : 

'■'■Resolved^ That the African trade is injurious to this celony ; 
obstructs the population of it hy freemen, prevents manufacturers and 
other useful emigraiits from Europe from settling among us, and 
occasions an annual increase of the balance of trade against this 
colony^ — (See American Archives, 4th series, vol. 1, p. 493.) 

"At a meeting of the freeholders, and other inhabitants of the 
coi;nty of Culpeper, in Virginia, assembled on due notice, at the 
Court-House of the said county, on Thursday, the 7th of July, 
1774, to consider of the most effectual method to preserve the 
rights and liberties of America : 

" Resolved, That the importing slaves and convict servants is 
injurious to this Colony, as it obstructs the population of it with 
freemen and useful manufacturers; and that we will not buy any 
such slave or convict servant hereafter to be imported." — (^Ameri- 
can Archives, 4th series, vol. 1, p. 523.) 



428 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

" At a general meeting of the freeholders and inhabitants of 
the county of Nanseniond, Virginia, on the 11th day of July, 
1774, the following resolutions were unanimously agreed to : 

" Resolved, That the African trade is injurious," etc., [same as 
the resolution of Prince George's county.] — (^American Archives. 
vol. 1, p. 530.) 

"July 14, 1774, at a similar meeting in Caroline county, Vir- 
ginia : 

^^ Resolved, That the African trade is injurious to this Colony, 
etc.; and, therefore, that the purchase of all imported slaves ought 
to be associated against." — (lb. p. 541.) 

"July IG, 1774, at a meeting of Surrey county, Virginia: 

"5th, Resolved, That, as the population of this Colony with 
freemen and useful manufacturers is grcatli) obstructed hy the im- 
portation of slaves and convict servants, we will not purchase any 
such slaves or servants hereafter to be imported." — (^American 
Archives, 4th series, vol. 1, p. 593.) 

"At a general meeting of the freeholders and other inhabitants 
of the county of Fairfax, Virginia, at the Court-House in the 
town of Alexandria, on Monday, the 18th of July, 1774, George 
Washington, Esq., in the chair: 

'■'■Resolved, That it is the opinion of this meeting, that, during 
our present difficulties and distress, no slaves ought to be im- 
ported into any of the British Colonies on this continent; and 
we take this opportunity of declaring our most earnest wishes to 
see an entire stop forever put to such a wicked, cruel, and 
unnatural trade. 

'■'■Resolved, That it is the opinion of this meeting, that a solemn 
covenant and association should be entered into by all the Colo- 
nies," etc., etc. — (^American Archives, vol. 1, p. 600.) 

George Washington, Mr. President, was the pre- 
sicling officer at one of these meetings. Certain 
young men here may have heard something of this 
George Washington! He was then a farmer of 
Fairfax. What he did after that meeting, shall be 



ox THE COMPEOMISE BILL. 429 

known, remembered, and revered, by a world, thou- 
sands of years to come, long after you and I, and all 
of us, have been food for worms. 

Similar meetings were held, and similar resolutions 
passed, in the following counties in Virginia i In 
Hanover, on the 20th July, 1774; in Princess Ann, 
in July of the same year. I extract from the same 
volume of American Archives the following, which, 
from Mr. Jefferson's connection with it, becomes im- 
portant. 

At a very full meeting of delegates from the differ- 
ent counties in the Colony and Dominion of Virginia, 
begun "in Williamsburg, the 1st day of August, 
1774, the following association was unanimously 
agreed to ;" I omit, Mr. President, all not bearing 
upon the subject of slavery, and quote only the 
following : 

"We will not ourselves import, nor j)ur chase any 
slave or slaves imported by any other person, after 
the first day of November next, either from Africa, 
the West Indies, or any other place.''^ It seems, Mr. 
Jefferson Avas a delegate to this Convention, but was 
jH^e vented by sickness from attending*. He however 
addressed a letter to the convention, which I com- 
mend to the especial attention of gentlemen from the 
South, who object so strongly to the expression of 
opinions as to slavery here. Mr. Jefferson, in one 
paragraph in his letter to the convention, writes 
thus, on the subject of negro slavery: "The abolition 
of slavery is the ijresent object of desire in these Colo- 
nies, where it was unhappily introduced in their 



430 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

infant state." Mark these words, Mr. President. 
He complains that slavery was introduced into our 
American Colonies in their '''' infant stated Would 
Mr. Jefferson, were he here to-day, send slavery to 
the infant colonies of Oregon, J^ew Mexico, and Cali- 
fornia? But Mr. Jefferson goes on to say: "But 
previous to the enfranchisement of the slaves we 
have, it is necessary to exclude all further importa- 
tions from Africa ; but our repeated attempts to effect 
this by prohibitions, and by imposing duties which 
might amount to prohibition, have hitherto been 
defeated by his Majesty's negative, thus preferring 
the immediate advantage of a few African corsairs 
to tlie lasting interest of the American States, and to the 
rights of human nature, deejily ivounded by this infamous 
practice. ''^ 

Here we see proofs undeniable that Mr. Jefferson, 
the leading spirit then, confidently anticipated, not 
the continuance and further extension of slavery, but 
its abolition; and in order to the speedy "enfranchise- 
ment" of the slaves then in Virginia, he desires to 
prevent their augmentation, by prohibiting their im- 
portation. He complains that slavery was preju- 
dicial to the ^''infanf Colony of Virginia. Were he 
here, would he not vote to exclude slavery from the 
'^Infanf colonies of Oregon, New Mexico, and Cali- 
fornia? We have seen that he drafted the clause 
against slavery in the Ordinance of 1787. We know 
he remained unchanged till his death. 

How stood public opinion, Mr. President, in the 
year 1775, in the State of Georgia? From the pro- 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 431 

ceedings of a iDatriotic association in Georgia at that 
time, called the "Darien Committee," I take the 
following : 

"We, therefore, the Representatives of the extensive district 
of Darien, in the Colony of Georgia, having now assembled in 
Congress, by authority and free choice of the inhabitants of the 
said district, now freed from their fetters, do resolve: 

"5. To show the world that we are not influenced by any con- 
tracted or interested motives, but a general philanthropy y'oy all 
mankind, of 'whatever climate, language, or complexion, we hereby 
declare our disapprobation and abhorrence of the unnatural prac- 
tice of slavery in America (however the uncultivated state of our 
country, or other specious arguments may plead for it), a practice 
founded in injustice and cruelty, and highly dangerous to our 
liberties (as well as lives), debasing part of our fellow-creatures 
below men, and corrupting the virtue and morals of the rest; 
and as laying the basis of that liberty we contend for (and which 
we pray the Almighty to continue to the latest posterity) upon 
a very wrong foundation. "We, therefore, resolve at all times to 
use our utmost endeavors for the manumission of our slaves in 
this Colony, upon the most safe and equitable footing for the 
masters and themselves." — (^American Archives, vol. 1, p. 1136.) 

From these papers, as well as the general history 
of the times, we can see what the fathers thouo-ht on 
this subject. May I not, with profound respect, 
suggest that these papers, dated in 1774 and 1775 
explain to us the meaning of the Declaration of In- 
dependence, adopted in 1776. Surely, the men who 
voted the foregoing resolutions in 1775, might, very 
consistently, in 1776, declare as they did— "We hold 
these truths to be self-evident, that all men were 
created equal; that they are endowed by their Crea- 
tor with certain inalienable rights; that among these 



432 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

are life, Uberftj^ and the pursuit of happiness." Well 
might these men, with their hearts purified from 
selfishness by the dreadful conflict which then was 
seen to be inevitable, feel that all men were equal 
before God, in whom alone they could trust for aid 
in that dark hour, and that therefore all men were or 
ought to be masters of themselves, and answerable 
only to the Creator for the use they should make of 
that liberty — well might those brave, good old men, 
after such a declaration, look up calmly and hope- 
fully to the Heavens and declare: "And for the sup- 
port of this declaration, with a firm 7^eliance on the 
protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to 
each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred 
honor." 

Mr. President, these men, when they spoke of 
slavery and its extension, did not get up some hybrid 
sort of "compromise," and consult some supreme 
court. They declared slavery an evil, a wrong, a 
prejudice to free colonies, a social mischief, and a 
political eAdl ; and if these were denied, they replied, 
"These truths are self-evident." And from the judg- 
ments of men they appealed to no earthly court; 
they took an appeal "to the Supreme Judge of the 
World." When I am asked to extend to this new 
Empire of ours, now in its infancy, an institution 
which they pronounced an evil to all communities ; 
when I refuse to agree with soine here whose judg- 
ments I revere, and whose motives I know to be 
pure, I can only say, I stand where our fathers stood 
of old, I am sustained in my position by the men 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 433 

who founded the first system of rational liberty on 
earth. With them by my side, I can afford to differ 
with those here whom I respect. With such authority 
for my conduct, I can cheerfully encounter the frowns 
of some, the scorn of all; I can turn to the fathers 
of such, and be comforted. They knew what was 
best for an infant people just struggling into exist- 
ence. If their opinions are worth anything — if the 
opinions of the ^''enerated men are to be considered 
as authority — I ask Southern gentlemen what they 
mean when they ask me to extend slavery to the 
distant shores of the Pacific Ocean, and the slave 
trade between Maryland and Virginia and that 
almost unknown country? 

I am considering the propriety of doing this thing 
as if the question were now for the first time pre- 
sented to us. I ask any Southern man, if there were 
not a slave on this continent, would you send your 
ships to Africa, and bring them here? Suppose this 
Confederation of ours had been formed before a slave 
existed in it, and suppose here, in the year of grace 
1848, you had acquired California and IN^ew Mexico, 
and you were told that there existed a modified 
system of slavery there, and that they wanted labor- 
ers there, would a Senator rise in his place and say, 
we will authorize the African slave trade, in order 
to introduce laborers into our infant colonies? If 
you would not bring them from the shores of Africa 
— buying them with some imagined '•''imrtus sequitur 
ventrem^^ branded on them somewhere, how can you 
prove to me that it would be right to transfer them 
28 



434 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

from Maryland or Virginia, three thousand miles, to 
the shores of the Pacific? If slavery were a curse 
to you in the beginning, but struck its roots so deep 
into your social and municipal system, as was then 
said, that it could not be eradicated entirely, how is 
it that you call upon me, as a matter of conscience 
and duty, to transfer this curse to an area of square 
miles greatly exceeding that of the thirteen States, 
when the Confederation was formed? If it is so that 
it is an evil — and so all you statesmen have pro- 
nounced it, and so all your eminent men, with the 
exception of a few in modern times, have regarded 
it — ^liow is it that you call upon me to extend it to 
those vast dominions which you have recently ac- 
quired? Is it true that I am obliged to receive into 
my family a man with the small-pox or the leprosy, 
that they may be infected? I know you do not 
consider it in that light now. But the gentleman 
from Virginia has said that it must be done. Why ? 
Because it is compassion to the slave. He can not 
be nurtured in Virginia; your lands are worn out. 
Sir, that statement sounded ominous in my ears. It 
gave rise to some reflection. Why are your lands 
worn out? Are the lands of Pennsylvania worn out? 
Are those of Connecticut worn out? Is not Massa- 
chusetts more productive to-day than when the foot 
of the white man was tirst impressed upon her soil? 
Your lands are worn out, because the slave has 
turned pale the land wherever he has set down his 
black foot! It is slave-labor that has done all this. 
And must we then extend to these territories that 



ox THE COMPKOMISE BILL. 435 

which produces sterility wherever it is found, till 
barren desolation shall cover the whole land? If 
you can call upon me, as a matter of compassion, to 
send the slave to California or Oregon, you can call 
upon me by the same sacred obligation to receive him 
into Ohio as a slave; and I would be just as much 
bound, as a citizen of Ohio, to say that the Constitu- 
tion should be so construed as to admit slaves there, 
because they have made the land in Virginia barren, 
and they and their masters were perishing, till Ohio 
had also become a w^ilderness. That reason will not 
do. Sensitive as Ohio may ap^^ear to the morbid 
benevolence spoken of— with which I have no sym- 
23athy at all — we can see through that — the citizens 
of Ohio can not accept these men upon such terms. 

What is there in the way, then, of my giving an 
intelligent vote on this subject? Nothing at all. I 
would take this bill in a moment, if I had faith in 
the processes through which that law is to -pass until 
it becomes a law in the Chamber below. But I have 
not that faith, and I will tell the gentleman why. It 
is a sad commentary upon the perfection of human 
reason, that with but a very few exceptions, gentle- 
men coming from a slave State — and I think I have 
one behind me who ought always to be before me — 
[Mr. Badger] with a very few exceptions, all emi- 
nent lawyers on this floor from that section of the 
country, have argued that you have no right to pro- 
hibit the introduction of slavery into Oregon, Cali- 
fornia, and new Mexico; while, on the other hand, 
there is not a man, with few exceptions ( and some 



436 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

highly respectable), in the free States, learned or 
unlearned, clerical or lay, who has any pretensions to 
legal knowledge, but believes in his conscience that 
you have a right to prohibit slavery. Is not that a 
curious commentary upon that wonderful thing called 
human reason ? 

[Mr. Underwood. — It is regulated by a line ! ] 

Yes, by 36° 30', and what is black on one side of 
the line is white on the other, turning to jet black 
again when restored to its original locality. How is 
that ? Can I have confidence in the Supreme Court 
of the United States, when my confidence fails in 
Senators around me here? Do I expect that the 
members of that body will be more careful than the 
Senators from Georgia and South Carolina to form 
their opinions without any regard to selfish considera- 
tions ? Can I suppose that either of these gentlemen, 
or the gentleman from Georgia on the other side of 
the Chamber [Mr. Johnson] , or the learned Senator 
from Mississippi [jMr. Davis], who thought it exceed- 
ingly wrong that we should attempt to restrain the 
Almighty in the execution of his purposes, as revealed 
to us by Noah — can I suppose that these Senators, 
with all the terrible responsibilities which -press upon 
us when engaged in legislating for a whole empire, 
came to their conclusions without the most anxious 
deliberation? And yet on one side of the line, in 
the slave States, the Constitution reads Yea, while on 
the other, after the exercise of an equal degree of 
intelligence, calmness, and deliberation, in the free 
States the Constitution is made to read Nay. 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 437 

I admire the Supreme Court of the United States 
as a tribunal. I admire the wisdom which contrived 
it. I rejoice in the good consequences to this Re- 
public from the exercise of its functions. I also 
revere the Senate of the United States. Here is the 
most august body in the world, they say, composed 
of men who have wasted the midnight oil from year 
to year — men who in cloisters, in courts, in legislative 
halls, have been reaping the fruits of ripe experience, 
and suddenly their mighty intellects, able to scan 
everything, however minute, and comprehend every- 
thing, however grand, utterly fail them, and they 
kneel down in dumb insignificance, and implore the 
Supreme Court to read the Constitution for them. 
I think the Senator from South Carolina must have 
had some new light upon the subject within the last 
few years, and that several of my Democratic friends 
on all sides of the Chamber must have been smitten 
with new love for the power and wisdom of the 
Supreme Court. Do you remember the case ad- 
verted to by the Senator from New Jersey to-day ? 
I recollect very well when we did not stop to inquire 
how the Supreme Court had decided or ordained. It 
had decided, with John Marshall at its head — a man 
whose lightest conjectures upon the subject of consti- 
tutional law have always had with me as much 
weight as the well-considered opinion of almost any 
other man — that Congress had power to establish 
just such a bank as you had ; but with what infinite 
scorn did Democratic gentlemen — Jackson Demo- 
crats as they chose to be called — curl their lips 



438 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

when referred to that decision of the Supreme Court. 
Then the cry was, " We are judges for ourselves ; we 
make no law unless we have the power to enact it." 
JSTow, however, the doctrine is, that here is one only 
tribunal competent to put the matter at rest forever. 
We are to thank God, that though all should fail, 
there is an infallible depository of truth, and it lives 
once a year for three months, in a little chamber 
below us ! We can go there. Now, I understand 
my duty here to be to ascertain what constitutional 
power we have ; and when I have ascertained that I 
act without reference to what the Supreme Court 
may do — for they have yet furnished no guide on 
the subject — ^we are to take it for granted that they 
will concur with us. I agree with gentlemen who 
have been so lofty in their encomiums upon that 
CouiH, that their decision, whether right or wrong, 
controls our action. But we have not hitherto en- 
deavored to ascertain what the Supreme Court would 
do. I wish next to ascertain in what mode this won- 
derful response is to be obtained — not from the Del- 
phic Oracle, but from that infallible divinity, the 
Supreme Court. How is it to be done ? A gentle- 
man starts from Baltimore, in Maryland, with a 
dozen black men, who have been slaves ; he takes 
them to California, three thousand miles oflf. JN'ow, 
I don't know how it may be in other parts of the 
world, but I know that in the State of Ohio we do 
not travel three thousand miles to get justice. What, 
then, is the admirable contrivance in this bill by 
svhich we can get at the meaning of the Constitution? 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 439 

It seems the meaning of the Constitution is to be 
forever hidden from us until light shall be given by 
the Supreme Court. Sir, this bill seems to me a rich 
and rare legislative curiosity. It does not enact 
"a law," which I had supposed the usual function of 
legislation. 'No, sir; it only enacts "a law-suit." So 
we virtually enact that, when the Supreme Court say 
we can make law, then we have made it ! 

But, sir, to have a fair trial of this question, so as 
to make it eifectual to keep slaves out of our Terri' 
tories, all must admit this trial should be had before 
slaves have become numerous there. If slavery goes 
there and remains there for one year, according to 
all experience, it is eternal. Let it but plant its 
roots there, and the next thing you will hear will be 
earnest appeals about the rights of property. It will 
be said : " The Senate did not say we had no right to 
come here. The House of Representatives, a body of 
gentlemen elected from all parts of the country, on 
account of their sagacity and legal attainments, did 
not prohibit us from coming here. I thought I had 
a right to come here ; the Senator from South Caro- 
lina said I had a right to come ; the honorable Sena- 
tor from Georgia said I had a right to come here ; 
his colleague said it was a right secured to me 
somewhere high up in the clouds, and not belong- 
ing to the world ; the Senator from Mississippi said 
it was the ordinance of Heaven^ sanctified by decrees 
and revealed through prophecy — am I not, then, to 
enjoy the privileges thus so fully secured to me ? I 
have i^roperty here;, several of my women have 



440 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

borne children, who have jjartus sequitur ventrem born 
with them — they are my j)roperty." Thus the 
appeal will be made to their fellow-citizens around 
them ; and it will be asked whether you are prepared 
to strike down the property which the settler in those 
Territories has thus acquired ? That will be the case, 
unless the negro from Baltimore, when he gets there 
and sees Peons there — ^slaves not by hereditary taint, 
but by a much better title, a verdict before a justice 
of the peace — should determine to avail himself of 
the admirable facilities afforded him by this bill for 
gaining his freedom. Suppose my friend from T^ew 
Hampshire, when he goes home, gets up a meeting 
and collects a fund for the purpose of sending a mis- 
sionary after these men ; and when the missionary 
arrives there, he proposes to hold a prayer-meeting ; 
he gets up a meeting, as they used to do in Yankee 
times, "for the improvement of gifts." He goes to 
the negro quarter of this gentleman from Baltimore, 
and says : " Come, I want this brother ; it is true he 
is a son of Ham, but I want to instruct him that he 
is free." I am very much inclined to think that the 
missionary would fare very much as one did in South 
Carolina, at the hands of him from Baltimore. This 
l)ill supposes the negro is to start all at once into a 
tree Anglo-Saxon in California — the blood of Liberty 
flowing in every vein, and its divine impulses throb- 
bing in his heart. He is to say: "I am free ; I am 
a Californian ; I bring the right of habeas corpus with 
me." At last he is brought up on a writ of habeas 
corpus — before whom? very likely one of those gen- 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 441 

tlemen who have been proclaiming that slavery has 
a right to go there ; for such are the men that Mr. 
Polk is likely to appoint. He has prejudged the 
case. On the faith of his opinion the slave has 
been brought there — what can he do ? There is his 
recorded judgment printed in your Congressional 
Report — ^what will he say? "You are a slave. Mr. 
Calhoun was right. Judge Berrien, of Georgia, a 
profound lawyer, whom I knew well, was right. I 
know these gentlemen well ; their opinion is entitled 
to the highest authority; and, in the face of it, it 
does not become me to say that you are free — so, 
boy, go to your master ; you belong to the class par- 
tus sequitur ventrem ; you are not quite enough of a 
Saxon!" What, then, is to be done by this bill? Oh! 
a writ of error or appeal can come to the Supreme 
court of the United States. How ? The negro, if he 
is to be treated like a white man, taking out an 
appeal, must give bonds in double the value of the 
subject matter in dispute. And what is that? If 
you consider it the mercantile value of the negro, it 
may be perhaps $1,000 or $2,000. But he can not 
have the appeal according to this bill, unless the 
value of the thing in controversy amounts to the 
value of $2,000. But, then, there comes in this 
ideality of personal liberty. What is it worth ? 
ISTothing at all — says the Senator from South Caro- 
lina — to this fellow, who is better without it. And 
under this complexity of legal quibbling and litiga- 
tion, it is expected that the negro will stand there 
and contend with his master, and coming on to 



442 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

Washington, will prosecute his appeal two years 
before the Supreme Court, enjoying the opportu- 
nity of visiting his old friends about Baltimore ! 

And now, Mr. President, if we have found upon 
the opinions of wise ones of old, upon the observa- 
tions of past and present time, that involuntary 
slavery is not useful, profitable, or beneficial to either 
master or slave, that such institutions only become 
tolerable, because, when long established, the evil is 
less than those consequences which would follow their 
sudden change, I think it will be admitted that we 
should prohibit involuntary servitude in the territo- 
ries ovei* which we have control. 

Here, then, the question arises, have we this pro- 
hibitory power? I have already said, that where 
the Supreme Court of the United States has solemnly 
adjudged any power to belong to any branch of this 
Government, such adjudication should, until over- 
ruled, have great, if not controlling, weight with Con- 
gress. What, then, are the adjudications of that 
court upon this point? I quote from the case so 
often referred to, American Insurance Compan}^, vs. 
Carter ( 1st Peters' Bejiorts, page 511 ) . On page 
542 of that case, the court say: "The Constitution 
confers absolutely on the Government of the Union, 
the powers of making war, and of making treaties 
Consequently, that Government possesses the power 
of acquiring territory, either hij conquest or treaty^ 
Again, on the same page, the right to make law for 
a territory is thus spoken of: "Perhaps the power 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 443 

of governing a territory of tlie United States, which 
has not, by becoming a State, acquired tlie means of 
self-government, may result necessarily from the fact 
that it is not within the jurisdiction of any particular 
State, and is within the power and jurisdiction of the 
United States. The right to govern may be the in- 
evitable consequence of the right to acquire territory ; 
but whichever may be the source whence the power 
is derived, tlie possession of it is taiquestionedJ^ 

Nothing can be clearer or more satisfactory on this 
point. While this doctrine conforms to the plain 
dictates of reason, it is satisfactory to knov/ that the 
principle has been strengthened by the uniform prac- 
tice under the Constitution. The latter class of cases 
is too numerous to permit even a reference to them 
all. They have been frequently adverted to in this 
debate, and therefore I need not again brmg them to 
the attention of the Senate. I therefore find the 
power of Congress to make law for a territory abso- 
lute and unlimited. I have only to consider whether 
a law prohibiting slavery, in a territory where slavery 
does not already exist, is sound policy for such ter- 
ritory. 

Now, if we can make any law whatever, not con- 
trary to the express prohibitions of the Constitution, 
we can enact that a man with |60,000 worth of bank 
notes of Maryland shall forfeit the whole amount if 
he attempts to pass one of them in the Territory of 
California. We may say if a man carry a menagerie 
of wild beasts there worth $500,000, and undertakes 
to exhibit them there, he shall forfeit them. The 



444 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIX. 

man comes back with his menagerie, and says that 
the Law forbade him to exhibit his animals there ; it 
was thought tliat, as an economical arrangement, such 
things should not be tolerated there. That you may 
do : he of the lions and tigers goes back, having lost 
his whole concern. But now you take a slave to 
California, and instantly your power fails; all the 
power of the sovereignty of this country is impotent 
to stop him. That is a strange sort of argument to 
me. It has ahvays been considered that when a 
State forms its constitution it can exclude slavery. 
Why so? Because it chances to consider it an evil. 
If it be a proper subject of legislation in a State, and 
we have absolute legislative power transferred to us 
by virtue of this bloody power of conquest, as some 
say, or by purchase as others maintain, I ask — why 
may we not act? x\gain; considering this as an 
abstract question, are there not duties devolving 
upon us, for the performance of w^hich we may not 
be responsible to any earthly tribunal, but for which 
God who has created us all will hold us accountable? 
What is your duty, above all others, to a conquered 
people? You say it is your duty to give them a 
Government — may you not, then, do everything for 
them which you are not forbidden to do by some 
fundamental axiomatic truth at the foundation of your 
constitution? Show me, then, how 3^our action is 
j)recluded, and I submit. Though I believe it ought 
to be otherwise, yet, if the Constitution of my country 
forbids me, I yield. The constitutions of many 
States declare slavery to be an evil. Southern gen- 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 445 

tlemen have said that they would have done away 
with it if possible, and they have apologized to the 
world and to themselves for the existence of it in 
their States. These honest old men of another day 
never could have failed to strike off the chains from 
every negro in the Colonies, if it had been possible 
for them to do so without upturning the foundations 
of society. 

I do not revive these things to wound the feelings 
of gentlemen. I know some of them consider this 
institution as valuable; but many of them, I also 
know, regard it as an evil. But slavery is not in 
Oregon, it is not in California; and when I find that 
you have trampled down the people in order to ex- 
tend your dominion over them, I feel it to be my 
duty, when you appeal to me to make laws for them, 
and the Supreme Court has said that I have the 
power to do so, to avert from them this evil of slavery, 
and establish free institutions, under which no man 
can say that another is his property. I do not doubt 
this power. I know that it has been considered of 
old, from 1787 till the present hour, to be vested in 
Congress. The judicial tribunals in the West have 
considered it so, and the Supreme Court of the United 
States have said in that decision, so often referred to, 
that it was so. Have they found any restrictions 
upon us ? 'No. And what would you do if you were 
in Oregon to-day, and it were a State ? What would 
you do, and you, and you ? Would any man here, 
if he were acting in a legislative capacity, say, "I 
feel myself bound to admit this evil into this country, 



446 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIN. 

for the benefit of some of the States who are over- 
burdened with slaves." If this were true, it would 
be the duty of the free States, in that fraternal spirit 
which ought to prevail between the various States 
of the Union, to admit slaves whenever the slave 
States became overburdened with them. Do we so 
act in legislating for our States? No; we say, "enjoy 
your slaves, or free them, as you will, but it is our 
wish that there shall be no slavery here." You nvay 
implore a State, if you will, to take slaves into its 
bosom for your convenience, but they do not feel 
themselves bound by any Government obligation to 
do it. Am I not, then, bound to lay the foundations 
of that State for whose future progress I am to be 
resj)onsible, in the way which I think the most likely 
to produce beneficial results to the people there ? 
And when I find myself possessed of this power, and 
clothed with commensurate responsibility, no threats 
of dissolution of the Union, no heartburnings here 
or there, and, least of all — ^that which we have heard 
much of out of doors — the coming Presidential elec- 
tion, shall deter me from pursuing this course. I 
am for making a law, in the language of the Ordi- 
nance of 1787 ; I would have it enacted that slavery 
shall never exist in that country. Then, when my 
black man comes to the Supreme Court of the United 
States, as provided in this bill, he comes with a 
positive law in his favor, that court must overrule 
the decision of the case in Peters, or else such appeal 
must be sustained. Then we will have acted upon 
the subject — we will have forbidden slavery. I 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 447 

observed that some gentlemen who handled this 
subject, were very careful to repeat, with emphasis, 
that slavery may go where it is not prohibited. That 
is the reason I prefer the Ordinance of 1787 to the 
so-called Compromise Bill. I have no doubt that 
every Senator who assented to that bill convinced 
himself that it was the best we could pass. I have 
no doubt that our friends from the North thought it 
would be effective in preventing slavery in these ter- 
ritories. But I see that the Senator from South 
Carolina does not think so. He supports the bill for 
the very reason that it will admit slavery ; the 
Senator from Vermont, for the reason that slavery 
is forbidden by it. N'ow, in this confusion of ideas, 
I desire that Congress, if it have any opinion, ex- 
23ress it. 

If we have any power to legislate over these Ter- 
ritories, how long would it take to write down the 
sixth article of the Ordinance of 1787? Those of 
us who think that ought to be a fundamental law in 
the organization of Territories, will vote for it ; and 
those of us who believe otherwise, will vote against 
it ; and whichever party triumphs, will give law to 
Oregon and California, bearing the responsibility. 
But I must say that I do not like what appears to 
me — I say it in no offensive sense — a shuffling off 
the responsibility which is upon us now, and which 
we can not avoid. The Supreme Court may over- 
rule our decision ; but if we think we have power to 
ordain that slavery shall not exist in that Territory, 



448 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

let US say so ; if not, let us so decide. Let us not 
evade the question altogether. 

That honorable Senators who reported this bill 
had its passage very much at heart, I have no doubt; 
nor do I feel disposed to deny that every man of 
them believed that it was just such a measure as was 
calculated to give tranquillity to the agitated minds 
of the people of this country. Well, I do not care 
for that agitation further than that I will look to it 
as a motive to inquire carefully what my powers and 
my duties are. I have heard much of this — I have 
been myself a prophet of dissolution of this Union ; 
but I have seen the Union of these States survive so 
many shocks, that I am not afraid of dissolution. 
Perhaps, indeed, when this cry of wolf has been long 
disregarded, he may come at last when not expected ; 
but I do not believe that the people of the South 
are willing to sever themselves from this Republic 
because we will not establish slavery here or there. 
If we have no power to pass the Ordinance of 1787, 
let the people of the South go to the Supreme Court 
and have the question decided. It will only be a 
few months till the court resumes its session here, 
and the question can then be tried. If the decision 
be against us, the gentlemen of the South can at 
once commence their emigration to these Territories. 
Let us, then, make the law as we think it ought to 
be made now. 

I am the more confirmed in the course which I am 
determined to pursue, by some historical facts elicited 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 449 

in this very discussion. I remember what was 
said by the Senator from Virginia the other day. It 
is a truth, that when the Constitution of the United 
States was made, South Carolina and Georgia refused 
to come into the Union unless the slave trade should 
be continued for twenty years ; and the North agreed 
that they would vote to continue the slave trade for 
twenty years ; yes, voted that this new Republic 
should engage in piracy and murder at the will of 
two States ! So the history reads ; and the condi- 
tion of the agreement was, that those two States 
should agree to some arrangement about navigation 
laws! I do not blame South Carolina and Georgia for 
this transaction any more than I do those Northern 
States who shared in it. But suppose the question 
were now presented here by any one, whether we 
should adopt the foreign slave trade and continue it 
for twenty years, would not the whole land turn j^ale 
with horror, that, in the middle of the nineteenth 
century, a citizen of a free community, a Senator of 
the United States, should dare to propose the adop- 
tion of a system that has been denominated piracy 
and murder, and is by law punished by death all 
over Christendom ? What did they do then ? They 
had the power to prohibit it ; but, at the command 
of these two States, they allowed that to be intro- 
duced into the Constitution, to which much of slavery 
now existing in our land is clearly to be traced. For 
who can doubt that, but for that woful bargain, 
slavery would by this time have disappeared from 
all the States then in the Union, with one or two 
29 



450 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

exceptions? The number of slaves in the United 
States at this period was about six hundred thou- 
sand; it is now three millions. And just as you 
extend the area of slavery, so you multiply the diffi- 
culties which lie in the way of its extermination. It 
had been infinitely better that day that South Caro- 
lina and Georgia had remained out of the Union for 
a while, rather than that the Constitution should 
have been made to sanction the slave trade for 
twenty years. The dissolution of the old Confedera- 
tion would have been nothing in comparison with 
that recognition of piracy and murder. I can con- 
ceive of nothing in the dark record of man's enormi- 
ties, from the death of Abel down to this hour, so 
horrible as that of stealing people from their own 
home, and making them and their posterity slaves 
forever. It is a crime which we know has been 
visited with such signal j^unishment in the history 
of nations as to warrant the belief that Heaven itself 
had interfered to avenge the wrongs of earth. 

In thus characterizing this accursed traffic, I 
speak but the common sentiment of all mankind. 
I could not, if I taxed my feeble intellect to the 
utmost, denounce it in language as strong as that 
uttered by Thomas Jefferson himself. JN'ay, more — 
the spirit of that great man descending to his grand- 
son, in your Virginia Convention, denounced the 
Slave Trade, as now carried on between the States, 
cis being no less infamous than that foreign slave 
trade carried on in ships that went down into the 
sea. I speak of Thomas Jefferson Randolph. If you 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 451 

would not go to Africa, and thence peoplj California 
with slaves, may you not perpetuate equal enormities 
here ? You take the child from its mother's bosom — 
you separate husband and wife — and you transport 
them three thousand miles off to the shores of the 
Pacific Ocean. 

I know that this is a peculiar institution ; and I 
doubt not that in the hands of such gentlemen as 
talk about it here, it may be made very attractive. 
It may be a very agreeable sight to behold a large 
company of dependents, kindly treated by a benevo- 
lent master, and to trace the manifestations of grati- 
tude which they exhibit. But in my eyes a much 
more grateful spectacle would be that of a patriarch 
in the same neighboThood, with his dependents all 
around him, invosted'Avith all the attributes of free- 
dom bestowed upoh tlajem by the common Father, in 
whose sight all are alike precious ! It is, indeed, 
a " very peculiar " institution. According to the ac- 
count of the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Davis] , 
this institution exhibits all that is most amiable and 
beautiful in our nature. That Senator drew a picture 
of an old, gray-headed negro woman, exhausting the 
kindness of her heart upon the white child she had 
nursed. This is true ; and it shows the good master 
and the grateful servant. But, sir, all are not such 
as these. The Senator concealed the other side of 
the picture ; and it was only revealed to us by the 
quick apprehension of the Senator from Florida [Mr. 
Westcott] , who wanted the power to send a patrol all 
over the country to prevent the slaves from rising to 



452 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

iii:)tiirn the order of society ! I had almost believed, 
after hearing the beautiful, romantic, sentimental, 
narration of the Senator from Mississij^pi, that Grod 
had, indeed, as he said, made this people in Africa 
to come over here and wait upon us, till the Senator 
from Florida waked me up to a recollection of the 
old doctrines of Washington and Jefferson, by assur- 
ing us that wherever that patriarchal institution 
existed, a rigid j)olice should be maintained in order 
to prevent the uprising of the slave. Sir, it is indeed 
a peculiar institution. I know many good men, who, 
as masters, honor human nature, by the kindness, 
equity, and moderation of their rule and government 
of their slaves ; but put a bad man, as sometimes 
happens, as often happens, in possession of uncon- 
trolled dominion over another, black or white, and 
then wrongs follow that make angels weep. It is, sir, 
a troublesome institution ; it requires too much law, 
too much force, to keej) up social and domestic secu- 
rity ; therefore, I do not wish to extend it to these 
new and as yet feeble Territories. 

Is it pretended that slave labor could be profitable 
in Oregon or California? Do we expect to grow 
cotton and sugar there ? I do not know that it 
may not be done there ; for, as the gentleman 
from IS'ew York has told us, just as you go west 
upon this continent, the line of latitude changes in 
temperature, so that you may have a very different 
isothermal line as you approach the Pacific Ocean. 
But I do not care so much about that. My objection 
is a radical one to the institution everywhere. I do 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 453 

believe, if there is any place upon the globe which 
we inhabit where a white man can not work, he has 
no business there. If that place is fit only for black 
men to work, let black men alone work there. I do 
not know any better law for man's good than that 
old one, which was announced to man after the first 
ti'ansgression, that by the sweat of his brow he should 
earn his bread. I don't know what business men 
have in the world, unless it is to work. If any man 
has no work of head or hand to do in this world, let 
him get out of it soon. The hog is the only gentle- 
man who has nothing to do but eat and sleep. Him 
we disj^ose of as soon 3-s he is fat. Difficult as the 
settlement of this question seems to some, it is in 
my judgment only so because we will not look at it 
and treat it as an original proposition, to be decided 
by the influence its determination may have on 
the Territories themselves. We are ever running 
away from this, and inquiring how it will affect the 
"slave States" or the "free States." The only 
question mainly to be considered is. How will this 
policy affect the Territories for which this law is 
intended ? Is slavery a good thing, or is it a bad 
thing, for them ? With my views of the subject, I 
must consider it bad policy to plant slavery in any 
soil where I do not find it already growing. I look 
upon it as an exotic that blights with its shade the 
soil in which you plant it ; therefore, as I am satisfied 
of our constitutional power to prohibit it, so I am 
equally certain it is our duty to do so. 

In the. States where law and long usage have made 



454 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

the slave property, as property I treat it. It is there, 
and while there it should and will receive that pro- 
tection which the Constitution and the good neigh- 
borhood of the States afford and require at our 
hands. But I should be false to my best convictions 
of duty, policy, and right, if by my vote I should ex- 
tend it one acre beyond its present limits. I may be 
mistaken in all this ; but of one thing I am satisfied — 
of the honest conviction of my own judgment ; and 
no imaginary interruption of the ties which bind the 
various sections of the Confederacy shall induce me 
to shrink from these convictions, whenever I am 
called upon to carry them out into law. 

But we are told that when the Constitution was 
made, there existed certain relative proportions be- 
tween the power of the slave and the power of the 
free States. I understood the Senator from South 
Carolina, that we were under obligations to preserve 
forever^ these relative proportions in the same way. 

[Mr. Calhoun. — I said nothing of the kind.] 

I am very happy to be undeceived. I understood 
the Senator to conceive that this is a question of 
power. It is not so. It is a question of municipal 
law, of civil polity. The men who framed the Con- 
stitution never dreamed that there was to be a con- 
flict of power between the slave and the free States. 
They never dreamed that the South was to contend 
that they would always be equal in representation in 
the Senate to the JSTorth. They had no idea of that 
equilibrium of power of which we have heard so 



ON THE COMPEOMISE BILL. 455 

mucli. The circumstances of that period forbade 
any such suj^position. Looking at all these circum- 
stances (and I have no doubt those far-seeing men 
regarded them carefully ) , you would have had four- 
teen free States and nine slave States, But every 
man who had much to do with the formation of the 
Constitution expected and desired that slavery should 
be prohibited in the new States; and they even ex- 
pected to have it abolished in many of the States 
where it existed. They had no idea of conflict; and 
if the ultra fanatics in the South, as well as those in 
the North, would let the subject alone, we should 
have much less difficulty in a proper settlement of 
the question. 

While the extreme fanaticism of the North, it is 
said, would burst the barriers of the Constitution and 
rush into the slave States to enforce their abolition 
views, trampling on your laws and madly overturning 
existing institutions there, the South vents its fiery 
indignation in tones of unmeasured reproach. But 
have Southern gentlemen considered their position 
before the world on this question? You declare the 
opinion that slavery does not exist either in Oregon, 
California, or New Mexico ; all these immense regions 
are now, and for many years have been, free from 
negro slavery. And now what do the ultra fanatics 
of the South ask? Sir, they avow their determina- 
tion to rush into these free territories, overturn the 
social systems there existing, uproot all establish- 
ments founded in and molded by an absence of 
slavery, and having thus swept away the former 



4o6 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

free systems, plant there forever, the system of in- 
vokmtary servitude. Sir, Southern gentlemen must 
say no more about the fanatics of the IN'orth endeavor- 
ing to uproot your institutions, while you imitate the 
example of those fanatics in your treatment of the 
free soil of this Union. Sir, there is no ditference 
between the two cases. The fanatics of the South 
are but a counterpart of those of the North. If 
there be any diiference, it is only this : The fanatic 
of the North has this apology — ^he proposes, at least 
in theory, to enlarge and extend the boundaries of 
human rights. The fanatic of the South, strangely 
inconsistent with the obvious tendencies of the age, 
seeks to extend, at one sweep, human black slavery 
over a country, new and sparsely settled, larger in 
extent than most of the governments of the old 
world. This does appear, to my poor judgment, not 
merely at war with the spirit of the age, with tho 
letter spirit, I would say, of men in all ages; nay, 
more — I must be pardoned if I declare it wears the 
aspect of absurdity, arrogance, and temerity. Sir, I 
have spoken out my opinions freely, boldly, but in 
no spirit of unkindness to any man or any section of 
our common country. I know how widely different 
are the views of other gentlemen from mine. I know 
how habit, usage, time, color our thoughts, and indeed 
form our principles often. But I must here repeat 
my belief, that if we could set about this business in 
the spirit of those who founded this Republic, we 
should have no difficulty in enacting the Ordinance 
of 1787. Sir, it is best to repeat what they did. In 



ON THE COMPEOMISE BILL. 457 

1787, they made the Constitution. In 1787, they 
made that celebrated Ordinance for the north-west. 
Sir, this doctrine of free territory is not new ; it is 
coeval with the Constitution, born the same year, of 
the same parents, and baj^tized in the same good old 
republican church. And now, when we are about to 
establish these new republics, much larger than the 
old, why should we not imitate their example, re- 
enact their laws, and thus secure to this new Republic 
on the Pacific the glory, the prosperity, the rational 
progress, which have shed such luster around that 
founded uj^on the shore of the Atlantic? 

A Senator who sits before me [Mr. Fitzgerald], 
has with great propriety explained to the Senate the 
position in which he is placed on this subject, as 
connected with his friend. General Cass, not now a 
member of this body. The subject, as bearing on 
the opinions and prospects of both General Cass and 
General Taylor, has been often adverted to in this 
debate. While I am yet on my feet, I desire to say 
a word or two on this aspect of the debate. 

I S23eak of one absent from this chamber with 
every feeling of respect, and with some reluctance. 
It is said, and I believe truly, that General Cass has, 
within the last two years, entertained two opinions 
on this subject, the one in direct conflict with the 
other. In other words, he has changed his opinion 
respecting it; whereas he was at mie time in favor 
of extending the Ordinance of 1787 over all new 
territory ; now, he denies the power of Congress to 
do so. Thus it follows that he would arrest all such 



458 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

legislation by interposing his veto. His position at 
present is fixed. But, sir, this facility in forming 
and changing opinions in a gentleman at his time of 
life, gives some hope that in the future he may not 
ohst'mately persevere in his error. Sir, one who on 
such subjects can change in the two past years his 
opinion, gives hopeful expectation that he may 
change back in the two years to come. As Major 
Dugald Dalgetty would say, " He will be amenable 
to reason." His opinion, it seems, is, that the whole 
subject is to be given over to the unlimited discretion 
of the Territorial Legislatures. As to General Tay- 
lor's position in regard to this and all like subjects 
of domestic policy, I here declare that if I did not 
consider him pledged by his published letter to Cap- 
tain Allison not to interpose his veto on such subjects 
of legislation, he certainly could not get my vote, 
nor do I believe that of any northern State. 

[ Mr. Hannegan. — I would like to be informed by the Senator 
from Ohio, as he has referred to General Cass's position, and as 
he is about to give his support to General Taylor, if he can give 
us General Taylor's views on the subject, and what his opinion 
will be, when expressed in a message to Congress?] 

I can not. 

[ Mr. Hannegan. — I understand the Senator from Ohio to 
say, that if General Taylor would interpose a veto upon the 
subject, he would not vote for him under any circumstances.] 

I would not, nor would any Whig in Ohio, unless 
indeed we found him opposed to just such another 
man who had a great many bad qualities beside. 
[A laugh.] But, sir, I have to say that I do not 



ON THE COMPROMISE BILL. 459 

believe that General Taylor could get tlie electoral 
vote of a free State in America, if it were not for 
the belief that prevails, that upon this subject, as 
well as upon any other of domestic policy, where 
the power of Congress had been sanctioned by the 
various departments of Government, and acquiesced 
in by the people, he would not, through the veto 
power, interfere to crush the free will of the people, 
as expressed through both branches of Congress. 

I repeat, sir, that if Congress, having the power as 
defined by the Supreme Court, acted on by Congress 
in various cases, as shown by your legislation, sanc- 
tioned in so many ways, and till now cheerfully 
acquiesced in by the people, should enact the Ordi- 
nance of 1787 over again, and extend it over the three 
Territories in question, and the man in the White 
House should interpose his veto, and again and again 
thrust his puny arm in the way of the legislative 
power, and arrest for a long time the popular will, I 
will not say he would be impeached, tried, and (if 
the law were so) have his head brought to the block. 
Patience might in its exhaustion give way to exas- 
peration, and the forms of law and the majesty of 
judicial trial all fall before the summary vengeance 
of an abused and insulted peoj^le. 

I know very well that the Senate is weary of this 
debate. I wish now only to state another fact, which 
will show what it is which our brethren of the South 
now demand. If you take the area of the free States 
and the slave States as they exist, and compare 
them, you will find that the latter predominate. 



460 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

Wlien the Constitution was formed, and when all 
the territory which you then had was brought into 
the Union, the free States had an excess of 100,000 
square miles over the slave States ; but when you 
had acquired Louisiana, Florida, and Texas, and 
added them to the Union, and when you have added 
the claim of the South, that they will carry their 
slaves into Oregon, JN^ew Mexico, and California, 
what will then be the condition of the free States ? 
The slave States will haA^e one-third more power in 
the Senate of the United States than the fi-ee States 
could ever have. 

Sir, if this is to be viewed at all as a question 
of power, what I ha^^e stated would be the exact 
result of yielding to the present claim of the South ; 
and this will be the result, unless you prohibit the 
introduction of slavery into these Territories. Sir, 
I have seen the working of this system. Plant 
thirty slaveholders among three hundred inhabits 
ants who are not slaveholders, and they will main- 
tain their position against the three hundred. Let 
one man out of fifty be a slaveholder, and he will 
persuade the forty-nine that it is better that the 
institution should exist. It is capital and social 
position, opposed to labor and poverty. How this 
war may wage in the future, I will not say; but 
thus far the former have ever been an over-match 
for the latter. 

But, sir, I do not like this view of such a subject. 
If it were merely a comparison of strength or con- 
tost for relative power, I could yield without a strug- 



ox THE COMPROMISE BILL. 461 

gle. But I am called on to lay the foundations of 
society over a A^ast extent of country. If this work 
is done wisely now, ages unborn shall bless us, and 
we shall have done in our day what experience 
approved and duty demanded. If this work shall 
be carelessly or badly done, countless millions that 
shall inherit that vast region will hereafter remem- 
ber our folly as their curse ; our names and deeds, 
instead of praises, shall only call forth execration 
and reproach. In the conflict of present opinions, 
I have listened patiently to all. Finding myself 
opposed to some with whom I have rarely ever 
differed before, I have doubted myself, re-examined 
my conclusions, reconsidered all the arguments on 
either side, and I still am obliged to adhere to my first 
impressions, I may say my long-cherished opinions. 
If I part company with some lieM^ whom I habitu- ^ 
ally respect, I still find with me the men of the 
'past., whom the nations venerated. I stand upon 
the Ordinance of 1787. There the path is marked 
by the blood of the Revolution. I stand in com- 
pany with the " men of '87," their locks wet with 
the mists of the Jordan over which they passed, 
their garments purple with the waters of the Red 
Sea through which they led us of old, to this land 
of promise. With them to point the way, however 
dark the present, Hope shines upon the future, and 
discerning their foot-prints in my path, I shall tread 
it with unfaltering trust. 



m DEFENSE OF JUDGE McLEAN. 

[Mr. FooTE, of Mississippi, at the conclusion of his remarks, 
by way of personal explanation, in the United States Senate, on 
the 23d of January, 1849, read an extract from " Councils, Civil 
and Moral, of Sir Francis Bacon," which he commended to his 
honor Justice McLean, who had the day before, published a card 
in the National Intelligencer, correcting a misrepresentation of 
certain of his letters written the preceding year. This extract, 
Mr. FoOTE remarked, contained "valuable hints" from which he 
hoped Judge McLean would profit — among others the follow- 
ing: "Judges ought to be more learned than witty, more reverend 
than plausible, and more advised than confident; above all things, 
integrity is their portion and proper virtue." 

Mr. Corwin's remarks. sufficiently explain the nature and pur- 
port of the accusation ag^iinst Judge McLean. Mr. Corwin said] : 

I 1)0 not rise, Mr. President, to interrupt further 
the ordinary course of business by the prolongation 
of this interlude, at all, but only to acquit myself 
from a sort of imputation which the Senator from 
Mississippi has pleased to cast upon me. 

[ Here Mr. FooTE disclaimed any intention to cast an imputa- 
tion upon him.] 

Mr. President, I dare say, from the apparent per- 
sonal address which the Senator from Mississippi 
made to me, as one who did not choose to rise here 
in defense of Judge McLean upon the accusation 
presented by that gentleman the other day, that he 
(462) 



DEFENSE OF JUDGE M^^LEAN. 463 

would have it inferred — at least others might infer — 
that I, by my silence, was yielding my acquiescence 
or agreement to the views taken by him of those two 
fugitive letters, out of which this grave charge has 
been manufactured. 

I did not think it worth while, the other day, when 
the Senator from Mississippi, on a motion to amend 
a post-office bill, took this view of the conduct of 
my friend. Judge McLean, to say one word in his 
defense ; for with the utmost deference in the world 
to the opinions then and now expressed by the Sen- 
ator from Mississij^i^i, I did not perceive that, with 
the facts before the public, it was possible for his 
remarks to cast in any mind, other than one very 
much like his own on particular subjects, the slight- 
est imputation whatever on the purity of character 
or the judicial rectitude of Judge McLean. All that 
I could perceive in the matter brought forth by the 
Senator from Mississippi, was the expression of an 
opinion upon two subjects, about which everybody 
knows there has been a very great contrariety of 
opinion in this country. Judge McLean, in a letter 
to some friend, who had evidently written to him on 
the subject, wishing to know his opinions on that 
great political question — the origin and conduct of 
the Mexican war — had expressed his views in rela- 
tion to the matter upon which he was interrogated. 
It may be possible he may be mistaken. In the 
minds of that class of politicians who agree with the 
Senator fi'om Mississijipi uj)on the subject. Judge 
McLean may have been considered in error in reg;.r(l 



464 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

to the origin of the Mexican war^ and the means 
which, in his judgment, should be applied to bring 
it to a speedy and honorable termination. But is it 
possible that the Senate of the United States is to be 
a court of error upon the preferment of a charge by 
any one, either in a news2:>aper or here, to correct the 
political opinions of a judge of the Supreme Court, 
who, on being interrogated by one of his fellow- 
citizens in a letter, ventures to express his views 
upon one of these much agitated topics? I could 
not conceive that the Senate of the United States or 
the people of the United States, could expect that a 
man, because he happens to hold the highly-resj^ect^ 
able and responsible station of a judge of the Supreme 
Court of the United States, can have no opinion in 
common with his fellow-men wpon a subject that has 
called forth the expression of feeling and opinions 
from almost every citizen of the republic. I do not 
conceive that, because the ermine to which the Sen- 
ator has so emphatically alluded, is upon his shoulder, 
his tongue is therefore ever to be silent. He is en- 
titled to a vote, in common with every man in the 
Republic, for a President, for a member of Congress, 
and of course he must exercise his own judgment 
upon such subjects with other men; and I had sup- 
posed that such exercise of his judgment, and ex- 
pression of it, too, would be tolerated by his fellow- 
citizens. 

Mr. President, Judge McLean has said in a letter 
to somebody (and really I do not know to whom 
that letter was addressed, nor did I apprehend ex- 



DEFENSE OF JUDGE MCLEAN. 465 

actl}^ its piirj^ort when alluded to the other day by 
the Senator from Mississippi), that he supposes 
slavery was not considered as having an existence in 
any country until its existence was established by a 
law. For that, I understand the Senator from 
Mississippi thinks that Judge McLean is in some 
degree culpable. Well, now, it seems that the 
Supreme Court of the United States have, in effect, 
so decided, and Judge McLean has referred to the 
decision of the Supreme Court, which, in his judg- 
ment, establishes this question of law. He has 
commented upon the decision of the court which has 
thus adjudicated the question; and I ask if it can be 
possibly manufactured into judicial impropriety for a 
judge of the Supreme Court to repeat what are the 
acknowledged decisions of that Court? I ask if it is 
likely that the people of this country, who have very 
long and very properly reposed great confidence in 
Judge McLean in various positions, political as well 
as judicial, can be brought to believe him guilty of 
moral turpitude for such an act? 

[ Mr. FoOTE here interposed a suggestion that the subject 
upon which Judge McLean had expressed his opinion in the 
letter complained of, is yet an open question, and undecided 
in the aspect given to it, by any court. He alluded to the 
arguments of distinguished jurists in the Senate, who cooperated 
in the Compromise Bill of the previous session, to show that 
such were their views, and that the question had never been 
adjudicated ; and it was in the face of the fact that it would be 
likely to come before Judge McLean for adjudication that the 
latter thought proper to pronounce his opinion. This he chal- 
lenged Mr. CoRWiN to "deny" or "vindicate" if he could.] 

30 



466 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWI]N^. 

I thought that question was settled before the 
(late at which this letter was written. 

[Mr. FooTE. — I stated the other day that the bill, although 
defeated at the last session, would probably be revived during 
this session and passed.] 

I do not remember whether that bill, to which 
the gentleman from Mississippi has alluded, called 
the Compromise Bill, had gone to its grave before 
this letter was written by Judge McLean or not, 
nor do I think it material. 

Judge McLean has only ventured to express, in 
relation to the subject of slavery, what is the pre- 
vailing professional opinion in that circuit in which 
he resides. I am sure I am not mistaken in this ; 
and I dare say the Senator from Mississippi knows 
it also. I do not intend, Mr. President, to enter 
into a controversy here in relation to the correct- 
ness of that opinion. I will only add to the high 
authority of Judge McLean upon that subject, one 
other — that is my own. I dare say the Senator 
from Mississippi will consider that as settling the 
question. That will be respected, I hope. It is 
my opinion, and I have not been able to gather 
from BlacJcstone's Commentaries anything to the con- 
trary. I know that there are few, very few, high 
authorities diifering from Judge McLean and my- 
self on that point. But if that be the fact, does 
it necessarily follow, Mr. President, when Judge 
McLean is merely so unfortunate as to diifer from 
the Senator from Mississippi, and other gentlemen 
of the highest professional respectability in the coun- 



DEFENSE OF JUDGE MCLEAN. 467 

try, that he is therefore unfit to preside in the cir- 
cuit north-west of the Ohio river, or sit upon the 
bench of the Sui;)reme Court of the United States ? 
I ask the Senator from Mississippi in all candor, if 
it would, under such circumstances, be quite fair to 
arraign in some sort as criminal the conduct of a 
man for the mere expression of his opinion upon a 
mooted question of law? Why, sir, if this were to 
be the rule by which we would try the judges of 
the Supreme Court, we should have to expel two 
or three of them from the bench at every term. 
They have their books of reports full of dissenting 
opinions. 

I know the Senator from Mississippi feels much 
upon this subject. I dare say he is anxious to pre- 
serve the judicial purity of the bench. But while 
he is guarding us on this vital point — and all must 
give high commendation to the motive which gov- 
erns him in this — would it not be well for the 
grave Senators who sit here and listen to these accu- 
sations, w^hich can result in nothing but recrimina- 
tion, to remember that we, too, under certain cir- 
cumstances, should be enrobed in this sacred and 
inviolable purple, and that it would be well for us 
not to prejudge any question which may possibly 
come before us. If Judge McLean has done any- 
thing unworthy of his judicial character, and worthy 
our notice at all, then I think he has done that 
which ought to bring him before us on an impeach- 
ment. How, then, would the Senator from Missis- 
sippi, with his judicial gravity, backed by Bacon 



468 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

and Cicero, appear? I am afraid that some here 
did not quite understand the gentleman's Latin, and 
I beg the Senator to transhite it for the benefit of 
country gentlemen like myself. How should we look 
with the ermine on our shoulders, if Judge McLean 
were here on trial ? We should, doubtless, strut 
through the scene with senatorial dignity, having 
prejudged the cause at the instance of the Senator 
from Mississippi. I dare say, the Senator from 
Mississippi would sit and adjudicate too upon this 
very question wdiich he had himself already pre- 
judged ! I do not mention this because I suppose 
it possible for any one to conceive for a moment of 
the existence of an imj^eachment against this excel- 
lent gentleman, for anything contained in his letters 
declining to become a candidate for the Presidency, 
unless, indeed, you impeach a man for the rarest of 
all qualities, modesty. I do not know but the exhi- 
bition, or even possession of that quality may be by 
some gentlemen considered a crime, but I do not 
think there is anything in Bacon or Cicero that 
would warrant us in taking off the head of the 
Judge for his exhibition of this amiable frailty. 

I do not know, and I will not venture to state, 
further than on the authority of Judge McLean 
himself — and I read his letter very hastily — that 
the Supreme Court have decided this very question ; 
but I think a fair interpretation of the judgment 
of the Supreme Court in the case of Rhodes and 
Slaughter, referred to by Judge McLean, would war- 
rant him in saying that they had decided a propo- 



DEFENSE OF JUDGE M' LEAN. 469 

sition from which it is deducible that slavery is a 
matter of municipal legislation, and could not exist 
without it. But he is not infallible — he may be 
mistaken. I wish he was infallible. I wish others, 
Mr. President, that I will not name, were so too. 

But I must say to the Senator from Mississippi, 
what I dare say he may have known, or heard of, that 
if it is supposed that the production of these letters, or 
any possible inference that can be drawn from them, 
will shake the confidence of those who have known 
Judge McLean personally during his whole political 
and judicial life, that all who indulge this belief, w^ill 
find themselves ( as mortal men often are ) sadly 
mistaken. It will not be believed that a man who 
has passed through the stations which he has filled, 
with so little exception ever taken to his public con- 
duct, has, at this period of his life, gone so far astray 
as to forfeit the good opinion of his fellow-citizens 
in that place which he has occupied with so much 
honor to himself, and, I will venture to say, with so 
much usefulness to the country, which he has so 
faithfully served for twenty years. 

Mr. President, let me again state that I do not 
rise to present the slightest objection to the expres- 
sion of the views the Senator from Mississippi takes, 
knowing that they are honestly his own peculiar 
views. Nor do I object in the slightest degree to his 
promulgating his opinions of Judge McLean or any 
other judge, at all times, and on all occasions, any- 
where and everywhere, but I felt myself compelled, 
representing, as I do, in part, the State in which 



470 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

Judge McLean has resided during the whole of his 
mature life, to say thus much, lest my friends might 
suppose (as the Senator from Mississippi, I suppose, 
did) that I silently acquiesced in the justness of his 
remarks on this and a former occasion. 



ON THE ACTION OF OHIO TOUCHING 
FUOITIYE SLAVES. 

[Pending the discussion of the slavery question in the United 
States Senate, April 3d, 1850, ujjon the resolutions submitted by 
Mr. Bell, which Mr. Foote moved to be referred to a committee 
of thirteen (Mr. Underwood, of Kentucky, having concluded), 
Mr. CoRWiN and Mr. Foote rose together, Mr. Corwin asked:] 

Will the Senator from Mississippi yield me the 
floor a few minutes, for the purpose of explaining a 
point in the laws of Ohio, referred to by the Senator 
from Kentucky? 

[Mr. Foote yielded the floor.] 

Mr. President, the Senator from Kentucky has 
been pleased to animadvert with some severity upon 
the legislation of Ohio touching fugitive slaves. I 
am satisfied if my friend from Kentucky would 
review carefully what has been done on this subject 
by the Legislature of Ohio, he would find reason to 
retract a portion of his remarks, and certainly to 
abate much of that asperity of feeling which his mis- 
taken views have inspired. I only desire to occupy 
the Senate a moment, while I correct Avhat I deem a 
mistake as to the constitutional character of the law, 
said by the Senator from Kentucky to have been 
revived by the statute of 1843. This act of 1843 
repealed the celebrated act passed, as we know, by 

(471) 



4/1! SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the Ohio Legishitiire, at the instance of commissioners, 
Messrs. Moreheacl and Smith, appointed by the 
authorities of Kentucky. The law of 1839, passed 
at the instance of the Kentucky commissioners, pro- 
vided against kidnapping, among other things. 

Sir, if the provisions of the act, which was revived 
by the law of 1843, were just such as the gentleman 
has represented,, I will not pretend to say here, with- 
out examination, whethei' they were or were not con- 
stitutional. The law of 1843 was, at that time, the 
only law in Ohio providing against kidnapping. 
When that law was repealed, it was necessary to 
re-enact the old or a similar law against the very 
common offense of kidnapping. To this end a law 
which had been very long in force, and which had 
been suspended by the act of 1843 was revived. I 
have not this revived law before me, but I believe it 
was simply an act making it penal to take by force 
out of the State any free man, black or white. Such 
laws, I imagine, or laws very similar, may be found 
on the statute books of many if not all the States. 
'Now, Mr. President, if the act revived does, as the 
gentleman supposes, contain a provision forbidding 
the seizure of any colored person, under any pretense, 
untkoiit warrant first obtained, and was therefore 
unconstitutional, and an infraction of the rights of 
slaveholders, then the celebrated act of 1839, passed 
at the instance of Kentucky, by her commissioners 
Smith and Morehead, was also unconstitutional ; for 
I am very sure it contained a provision making it a 
penitentiary offense for any person to seize a colored 



TOUCHING FUGITIVE SLAVES. 473 

man until lie should first obtain process for that pur- 
pose from a judicial officer. 

Sir, we hear loud complaints of the revived Ohio 
law, such as that it disturbed the fraternal relations 
of Ohio and Kentucky. It was just what Kentucky 
herself had asked, and agreed to in the celebrated 
act of 1839. By that law, if a Kentuckian laid his 
hand on a black man in Ohio, to arrest him as a 
slave, without first filing an affidavit and obtaining a 
warrant, he must go to the Ohio penitentiary. These, 
sir, were the terms fixed by treaty between the two 
States ; these were the happy, peaceful, fraternal re- 
lations of the two States as settled by themselves. 
Sir, it seems to me, if the present law of Ohio against 
kidnapping be unconstitutional, she [Kentucky] has 
no right to complain, since she herself asked for and 
agreed to the same provision, in the act of 1839. 

Mr. President, this is a matter of small signifi- 
cance, it is true; but it is well to settle the matter 
of history aright before it finds its way into Greeley's 
Almanac, so that posterity may not be deceived. I 
will only add, sir, that whatever the letter of our 
laws may have been, I have never known or heard 
of a case in Ohio, where any person was punished 
for arresting a slave under any circumstances, where 
the person charged could prove that he was really 
the owner, or agent of the owner, of such slave. 



ON THE BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF 
WM. DARBY. 

In the U. S. Senate, Ajyril 23, 1850. 

[This bill proposed to give tlie venerable author of "Darby's 
Uazetteer" the sum of $1,500 for the use of a Map prepared 
from materials collected by Mr. Darby while acting in the capa- 
city of a Deputy Surveyor for the Government. Mr. Darby was 
then of very advanced age, in humble circumstances, subsisting 
upon the salary of a clerkship of the lowest grade in the Govern- 
ment. Mr. CoRWiN observed] : 

This application was referred to a select com- 
mittee, of which I happened to be chairman at the 
time; and the report from it, just read, was pre- 
pared by myself. Now I agree with the Senator 
[Mr. Turner], who has just taken his seat, that there 
is no legal claim presented here ; but I can not agree 
with him that there is not an equitable claim, and 
just such an equitable claim, I imagine, as has been 
repeatedly recognized by both branches of Congress. 
The map mentioned, and upon which the memorial 
and claim are based, was made upon the individual 
researches and labors of the memorialist, at a very 
early period of time, and before, I believe, the 
cession of Louisiana was ascertained; and it has 
since been, in every treaty which the Government 
has chosen to make respecting our boundary in that 
quarter, the basis upon which that treaty has pro- 
ceeded. Now, does it appear to the Senate that 
(474) 



BILL FOR THE RELIEF OF WM. DARBY. 475 

any other person lias done the same thing ? Does it 
appear to the Senate that these labors of Mr. Darby 
have been of real value to the Government and peo- 
ple of the United States, and that no other person's 
labor has furnished those materials which this Gov- 
ernment has availed itself of, from time to time, in 
settling those questions that have been often the sub- 
ject of discussion, and of very deep interest, concern- 
ing our boundaries, arising out of the treaty of the 
cession of Louisiana? In these matters, as every 
one is aware, that has been the map upon which 
every treaty has been regulated. The materials for 
it were furnished at his own expense, and by labors 
which very few are willing to encounter. It is true, 
the main object of them was the gratification of his 
own curiosit}^, if you please, for every one who knows 
anything of the history of this man, knows that he 
has been all his life engaged in these matters, and 
that he is a gentleman of uncommon endowments. 
Of these qualities and labors of the man the Govern- 
ment of the United States have availed themselves 
in the way in which reference has been made. Sup- 
pose that Mr. Darby, instead of ascertaining the 
boundaries of the territories in that quarter, and 
furnishing this information, had gone with a com- 
jDany of men, one of these pioneer expeditions of 
which we have heard, and driven otf the Indians, 
elevated the iVmerican flag, and established the 
American power on his own resj)onsibility and at 
his own expense, in a country which at last should 
come into the possession of the United States. Then, 



476 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIX. 

if ^Ir. Darby presented a memorial, showing at what 
great expense he had marched through the comitry, 
and established the flag of the United States where 
it had not before been known, and carried the Ameri- 
can eagle into lands where it had never soared before, 
and killed several Indians, perhaps, all of which the 
Government had availed itself of, how many sections 
of land would you give him ! How many sections of 
land have you given for such services ? How many 
propositions now lie on your table of such a char- 
acter? Now, the country derives benefit from all 
this. The one is the achievement of gunpowder, and 
the other of science, for your benefit, and not merely 
for your benefit, but for the benefit of all men. 
Xow, by these facts which he has collected, and by 
these labors, of which you have availed yourself, you 
have been benefited, and yet you have never paid 
Mr. Darby for them. What is equity, I beg to know, 
as contradistinguished from legal obligations ? Here 
is work and labor done of which you have had the 
benefit, and there (pointing to the bill) is the bill of 
particulars, sir, and why not give him compensation 
therefor ? 

[Senator Dawson liere remarked, " We will pass it."] 
Very well, then, I have nothing more to say. 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 

[On the 19th of August, 1859, Mr. Corwin addressed a large 
political assemblage at Ironton, Lawrence County, Ohio, upon the 
questions of the day. His speech on that occasion was reported in 
the Cincinnati Gazelle, a revision of which is now presented to the 
readers of this volume. Among the distinguished persons present 
at the meeting, and to whom allusion is made in Mr. Corwin's 
remarks, were William Dennison, Jr., the Republican candidate 
for, and since elected. Governor of Ohio, and Laban T. Moore, 
member of Congress elect from the ninth district, Kentucky, 
Mr. Corwin said :] 

My Fellow-Citizej^s : 

If it were a part of my design, in visiting this por- 
tion of the State, to exhibit myself as an orator, I 
should feel, as my venerable friend,* would feel for 
me, after what you have heard. I have no ambition 
in addressing my fellow-citizens, at all events, in popu- 
lar assemblies, to discharge any other duty to myself 
or them, than that, if it may be possible, of commu- 
nicating some information which shall be useful to 
them in the discharge of their duty as voters. 

You who are intrusted with the exercise of that 
great office of voting which you have so shamefully 
and so strangely neglected in all your lifetime — you 
who come here to understand, it may be, your duties 
from men who come from a distance of two or three 
hundred miles, do well ; but to you who come to 



* The President of the meeting. 

(477) 



478 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

listen to smart speeches or fine orations, allow me to 
say in candor, as one interested in the manner in 
which this duty is to be discharged, that you had 
better have staid at home ; if you have an honorable 
calling in the world, or honest occupation in life, you 
should have attended to it to-day, instead of coming 
to hear me. 

You have heard, in the glowing language of my 
friend, in the ardor and sincerity of his own spirit, 
that bead-roll of oifenses, God knows it w^as a 
melancholy catalogue of crime, which he exhibited 
against the public men of the State of Ohio and 
the United States. Now, whenever any man in 
speaking of the atfairs of your Republic, shall be able, 
with truth and in candor, to pronoitnce the officers 
of the Government unworthy the trust reposed in 
them ; to have violated their pledges, if it be so, or 
wdllfully neglected the duties of the various posts to 
wdiich they have been assigned ; if ever any man can 
say that of your public men, with truth, then he has 
pronounced a condemnation upon the whole system 
of the American Republic, for he has said that men 
intrusted with the duty of appointing officers do not 
know how to go about the discharge of their duty, or 
do not care in what manner they do discharge it. If 
there be any man whose heart is filled with shame 
and anguish, when he hears these things said — if 
there be any man who feels thus, I hold it is impos- 
sible, in the nature of things, that he will not, for the 
moment, doubt the propriety of giving universal 
suifrage to any people. 



ON CUREENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 479 

Now some of my Democratic brethren will go 
away and say that I am a Federalist, on account of 
what I have said here to-day, but I have felt it my 
duty to say thus much, everywhere. I have no 
doubt of the intelligence of the people. I have no 
doubt of the general integrity and of the honesty of 
the hearts of the mass of all the parties that ever 
existed in this Republic ; but I assert that I have 
doubts whether the people of this country do faith- 
fully attend to the election of their officers. Why do 
I say this? Because, if you will believe what has 
been said by either of the great political parties, for 
the last thirty years, the public men whom you have 
had in office, have been unworthy of the places which 
they have filled. Whose fault is it that your State 
of Ohio is inflicted with a heavy loss of $750,000 — 
money wrung from the pockets of the people, by 
direct taxation ? It is gone, and you know not where 
it is. It is your fault. You elected the men to office. 

Let me suppose that some monarch at Washing- 
ton City was invested with the power of appointing 
the agents of States to office, to do as he pleased with 
the government of the States, and that monarch 
appointed servants as unfaithful to their duties as 
yours are said to have been, what would you do with 
him ? My life upon it, if there was one drop of the 
blood that coursed in the veins of your forefathers 
left warm within you, there would be found some 
patriotic man to drive the dagger to the heart of that 
despot. What then is to be done with you, who vote 
for and elect all these men ? 



480 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIN. 

I believe it is now conceded by very many of the 
Democratic party that the present Chief Magistrate 
has lamentably disappointed even those who elected 
him. He has not disappointed those who opposed 
his election, for they predicted that everything would 
go wrong under his administration. There are very 
few Democratic aspirants to office in the North, or 
West, who dare avow themselves friends of the 
President. Thus it seems that this officer is now con- 
demned by many of those who voted for him. How 
came they to elect such a man as that ? Had they 
not sense and sagacity enough to know a man whose 
life had been before them on their public records for 
thirty or forty years ? Were they so ineffably stupid, 
that they did not investigate that man's life, to know 
him before they appointed him to that high office ? 
They could have done it, but did not do it. The 
great office of electing President and Grovernor and 
Legislatures, State and Federal, the great office which 
you hold, you sadly neglect. I assert that the duties 
of the Presidency have been discharged with quite 
as much fidelity as has been shown by many of the 
people of the United States in the exercise of their 
great office — the elective franchise. This is not so 
because you are not intelligent — nor because you 
are bad men, but because every man has the same 
interest and power that you have, and you say, 
"Let somebody else do it." "I will not interest 
myself in this, or I will be called a politician — the 
brethren of my church won't like it ; why should I 
disturb myself about this thing? I have my own 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 481 

ai!iiirs to attend to, and 1 will attend to them, and 
as for this business of regulating the affairs of the 
Republic, I will leave that to those fellows who want 
office." That is the way you think about it; that is 
the way you have acted with it. If you had not 
acted in that way, I tell you that few of these calam- 
ities which you have now to deplore would have 
occurred ; few of these great instances of blundering 
would have happened. Why have you not done 
this ? I say, you will not attend to this business ; if 
you did,. if you had done so, then I think it must fol- 
low, as a legitimate conclusion, that you don't know 
how. So much for the consideration of my brethren 
in this private little class-meeting of ours, of two 
or three thousand persons, where we are consider- 
ing the state of religion in the American Church, 
and lighting up a candle and j)utting it into every 
man's hand that he may search his own bosom. 

Let those gentlemen who feel themselves quite too 
respectable and decent to mingle in our elections, 
remember that God Almighty will hold them respon- 
sible for the manner in which they discharge their 
duty as voters. That right and privilege is not given 
to them for their benefit, or to be used at their pleas- 
ure, but for my benefit, for your benefit, and for the 
benefit of the thirty millions of people in the United 
States. If one sees an unworthy man go to the polls 
and take possession of the Government, and he will 
not prevent it, if there be such a thing as future 
responsibility — as we all believe — that man will 
31 



482 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWIN. 

have something to answer for upon that final clay 
when all of us must account for our acts. 

Do you suppose that the old men who published 
that Declaration of Independence, which gave birth 
to your national existence, for the maintenance of 
Avhich they appealed to the God of nations, approve 
of this neglect ? They felt their own weakness, they, 
acting upon the . commonly accepted principles of 
human reason, felt that they would perish in the con- 
flict into which they were then about to enter ; and 
at last, as poor feeble man always does when he feels 
he has nothing to lean ujoon but his own arm, he 
goes to the Almighty for help in that hour of trouble. 
They aj^pealed to Him, and He answered well in the 
day of their trial ; and all the struggles they endured, 
all the blood they shed, all the pains and privations 
they suffered, were simply to end in just one thing — 
in communicating to every rational free man equal 
power to govern the nation. That office they com- 
municated to you — the voting people of the country. 
Did they suppose — could they have believed that the 
people of this country, the respectable people of the 
land, would so scorn the great and priceless estate 
which they left them, as that they would not attend 
to appointing the agents to take care of it, but that 
some mercenary spirit was to take care of them ? 

If each member of the community had an interest 
in a banking institution, or in a joint stock manu- 
facturing company, where his reward was to be but a 
few paltry dollars per cent, on his capital — if a 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 483 

meeting was called to appoint a president or an 
agent of that company, he would attend this meet- 
ing, to elect this president and director of the paltry 
bank or joint stock concern ; but when the president 
and directors are to be elected to take care of the 
liberties of the whole country, oh, these men are too 
decent, too respectiible, to attend. It is not respect- 
able to be a politician, they tell us, or they are too 
careless, or they have half an acre of buckwheat 
which might not be got in and saved, if they left 
home on the election-day. 

That is the way you act with your privileges. Let 
us cease complaining of the men you elect, and of the 
law^s they make. One thing we know to be perfectly 
certain, the stockholders do not attend to the election 
of the president and directors, or if they do, they 
don't know how to do their duty. 

Don't let us blame our Presidents so much ! Don't 
let us anathematize the men we have elected to these 
offices of State, too much ! Let us abuse the people 
who elected them. They are to blame for wrongs 
done, if any have been done. If you elect a judge, 
and he does not attend at court, and if an innocent 
man is hung because he was not there to try him, 
what do you with him? You take him to Columbus 
and impeach him. He is removed from office, and 
the brand of disgrace and ignominy is placed upon 
his brow. But you can be absent from elections, and 
let unworthy men be elected to office. You don't 
like some party or other. The judge might say 
he did not like his associate; he did not like 



484 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

to sit near him — he had not a very sweet breath. 
I tell you, sirs, that is quite as valid as many of the 
excuses that men make for staying away from elec- 
tions. 

What have you been doing now, to go no further 
back than the last few years — sixteen or seventeen? 
All of you of mature age, remember the year 1840 
very well. What did all tlie people of the United 
States do then? They rose up with mingled feel- 
ings of merriment and indignation — for it was diffi- 
cult to tell which prevailed that 3'ear, the events of 
the administration of Mr. Van Buren, had been so 
singularly out of the way, nowise conformable to 
anybody's notion of things, it was difficult to say 
whether it was looked at with indignation, contempt, 
or merriment. Many of his officers were running 
away with the people's money — you know how we 
used to show up the leg-treasurers! Three-quarters 
of the people started up and declared, we will 
have no more Democratic government; we will 
have Whig government. The principles upon which 
these two parties were contending, then, for your 
suffrages, were diametrically opposed. Upon due 
deliberation and solemn consideration (for I do hope 
you sometimes consider these things), it was de- 
termined by an unexampled majority of the country 
that, henceforth, Wliigs and their principles should 
be the rule of conduct in the United States. It 
was so! Your decree, when you make it, is always 
omnipotent. 

Four years pass away — they go by — and what 



ON CURKENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 485 

happens then? You have again to appoint a Presi- 
dent of this great joint-stock company of ours. The 
people have two men presented to them. One has 
been alluded to by my friend, Mr. Dennison — Mr. 
Clay, of Kentucky — a man who has been spoken of 
so much, that it would be idle to attempt to employ 
terms adequate to express the feelings with which 
one who knew him as well as I did, regarded the 
great loss we have sustained by his death; a man 
of whom the nation was proud, a man who had a 
European reputation, who was regarded as the great 
champion of regulated liberty, by men of intelligence, 
all over the world ; in addition to this he had endow- 
ments which it has pleased God very rarely to give 
to mortal man; an integrity as pure as the highest 
integrity of the highest and best of the ancient 
people who have descended to us as demi-gods. 
Nobody questioned this in the election at all. It was 
named and repeated every hour. He did not like 
the annexation of Texas to the United States; not 
because he himself had any personal objection to 
any accumulation of slave States in the country, but 
because he believed it would disturb the harmony of 
the Republic as it then existed. The harmony and 
prosperity of this land were the idols of his heart. 
Another man was also presented to the American 
people — a very ordinary man. ( I wish to speak of 
him in no terms of disparagement.) You all know 
something of Mr. Polk. He never pretended to be 
the equal of Mr. Clay. Mr. Polk differed from him 
with regard to the annexation of Texas. He desired 



486 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

that that independent Republic, living under the 
shadow of our wing, should be annexed to the United 
States. He was a democrat of the Democrats. I 
knew him well. You know that I speak truly of his 
history. As a politician he was opposed to every- 
thing now proposed by the Opposition in the slave 
States, and by the Republican party in the free 
States, as the proper system of government in this 
country. Well, Clay proposed to the country to 
continue the Whig government begun by Mr. Har- 
rison, and but partially carried out by his successor. 
You had determined, four years before that, hence- 
forward you would only have Whig principles and 
Whig rulers. Four years passed by, and with the 
mighty difference between the two men, you deter- 
mined by a very large majority you would have no 
more Whig government, but would have Democratic 
government, even when you could have the pleasure 
and the pride of voting for one of the greatest states- 
men the world ever knew. The stockholders changed 
their opinion greatly in these four years, or else they 
did not vote their principles at all. 

Well, as we know human nature is full of imper- 
fection, and as men are gaining light every day in 
the world, we fondly hoped by the school-houses and 
churches which we had erected, we would get some 
intelligence. We began to suppose that we were 
mistaken in 1840, and that we had learned that the 
Democratic was the true rule of government in the 
country. 

Four years more rolled round, which brings us to 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 487 

1848. The country, in the meantime, had been 
involved in a foreign war, and it is very rare, when 
the ambition of our Republic is concerned, and that 
ambition is put into conflict with another nation, that 
the men of the nation do not take sides with him 
who wages the war. Wliat did we in 1848? With 
about the same unanimity as before, we declared that 
we would have no more Democratic government, we 
will have a Whig government, even though we have 
to deposit this great power of statesmanship in the 
hands of a man fresh from the battle-field, who was 
never in the councils of his country. The stock- 
holders have changed back again! 

Four years more rolled around, and 1852 comes 
upon us, and finds us still increasing in light and 
knowledge. Mind, in 1848 we jumped back just 
eight years. We found, I suppose, that the light 
had been leading us astray — that we failed in 1844. 
Now we are at the stand-point of 1840 again. In- 
stead of keeping our resolution to continue a Whig 
government, we have found out that we were mis- 
taken a second time, and we take not General Scott, 
who was by no means an ordinary man. He was a 
Whig, and you put awa}" that illustrious general and 
that eminently qualified statesman, and took a man 
who w^as not ([uUe his equal in peace or war. I wish 
to speak in no way disrespectful of Mr. Pierce, but I 
say that you fell so much in love with democratic 
government, that you threw away a Whig who was 
eminently qualified as a statesman and renowned as a 
warrior, and took a man not renowned in either wa}^ 



488 g:PEEOHES OF THOMAS CORWIW. 

'Now this, and all of this, is applicable to all of us. 
What would you think of any man — to illustrate — 
of any farmer, who would take one of those fine 
]^atent plows and plow down his barren ground, and 
raise a good crop upon his land which he had thrown 
aside as useless, gather his crop into his garner, 
reap the reward of his labor, thank Grod for his 
fruitful harvest and j^ocket the money it brings to 
him; and then when he had another crop to raise, 
should say, "By that plow I got a good crop, a better 
one than I expected, but as I have the power to do 
as' I please with my own land, I will try the old 
•go-devil' plow this year." You all know what a 
"go-devil" is. "You know it is a harrow with three 
prongs, a very good thing in its way, but by no 
means a good thing to break up ground with. 
Well, he takes his "go-devil" and he kicks his 
ground about, and he gets no crop, and you all 
know well he can't get much of a crop that way, 
anyhow. Now he gets in debt. He says: "Well, I 
was a great fool to take that 'go-devil;' I will get 
that patent plow to work again." The third year he 
uses that plow again, and he gets another good crop, 
and gets out of debt. He gets his money into his 
pocket, and goes to his thanksgiving dinner, eats 
his turkey and thanks Grod for his goodness. The 
fourth year, however, he says: "Have I not a right 
to do as I please, I will take that, old 'go-devil' 
again;" and he takes it, and the result again is 
quite devilish. 

That is precisely what you, the people of the 



ox CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 489 

United States, have done with your power of voting. 
That is exactly what you have done. Do you wonder 
that those veteran old statesmen in Europe, such as 
Metternich, or Walewski, and Palmerston and Derby, 
who have read over and over again all that is said 
about popular government and all that has been 
written, and have seen it always remarked that 
es23ecial care must be taken to guard against the 
carelessness and vacillation of the people, do you 
wonder when those old gentlemen see what you have 
done, how you have acted with the exercise of this 
right of suffrage, as if you did not care what became 
of your country, or did not know what ought to be 
done, changing four times in four successive elections 
from Whig to Democrat and from Democrat to 
Republican, that they should doubt your discretion? 
It seems as if you did not know how to do this work. 
Do you su^^pose that any man who acted with his 
plows as I have stated to you, could ever make a will 
in the world? I tell you no judge would allow such 
a man's will to go on record, because such a man 
must be insane. If that man were to make a deed 
of a house and lot, and his heirs were to prove this, 
it woiild be declared null and void. If his heirs 
should want to set aside such a man's deed, let them 
send for me, and I will set it aside before any intelli- 
gent jury in your country, because the man must 
be insane. 

Yet you have done the same thing with this right 
of voting. You have acted in just that way, and 
now, when we lift up our hands with indignation, at 



490 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the bad conduct of our rulers, don't let us blame the 
"go-devil" because he did not go twelve inches into 
the ground, because he can't. That is what we have 
done. Let us cast the beam out of our own eye, and 
then we will see clearly the mote that is in the poor 
President's eye. I pray you, ponder these things. 
Do they not, as we hear it said sometimes, "look to 
a man up a tree" like truth? 

Xow, my fellow-citizens, it is because of these 
things, and because I am, as a citizen, interested in 
this matter, that I have the impudence at all to come 
and speak to you about it. We are to elect a Presi- 
dent and Directors soon again, and I am interested 
in that election, just as you are, and if you are weak 
enough to listen to me, I must speak what I believe, 
and speak such belief plainly to plain men. 

We here have parties ! I am not one of those who 
belie A^e that political parties are natural necessities. 
I am not one who believes that as men of sense and 
discretion, we have need to differ about this thing at 
all. I admit that parties are made necessary by the 
present imperfections of mankind. But while I 
would admit as much, I would beg of you to put 
away the little, mean and trifling ambitions and 
asperities of parties, and my life on it, if you would 
do that there would not be so much party in the 
country as there is. You should have a President 
who would summon the whole faculties of his head 
and the better emotions of his heart, and concentrate 
them upon the idea that he w^as the representative 
of the only free government on the face of the earth. 



ON CUEREXT rOLITICAL ISSUES. 491 

^md the one supposed to be the model of all to come 
after us in all nations of the world, that want to be 
free — if we could but get a man that would elevate 
himself so high as to think that, and act upon it — 
iiewspaper paragraphs would be somewhat changed. 
We have seen lately a statement in the papers to 
this effect. Some post-master, far away in the 
prairies of Illinois, the gross receipts of whose office 
might be equal to five dollars a year, had the im- 
pudence to poke his head out of the little log cabin 
in which his office was held, and say that he thought 
Stephen A. Douglas was a respectable man. lie 
was overheard by some poor man — not poor in 
property, but poor in soul, who had a little starved 
and miserable soul in him, who wrote to this 
mighty representative of the only free country on 
the face of God's earth, taking care of the liberty 
of thirty millions, that he did not like ]Mr. Douglas, 
while the other man, the post-master, did. Pie 
begged that the President would send forth a man- 
date to that poor little fellow on the prairies, who 
was collecting his five dollars per year (I dare say 
about the fifth part of the expense of his fuel for one 
winter), to go out of office and let some man come 
in who did twt like Mr. Douglas. 

That is a fact, so they say. Don't let me now be 
holding up Mr. Buchanan as an exception. Such 
has been too much the case with every President 
since this party spirit has been so much in vogue. 
AMiig and Democrat, etc., have been guilty of the 
same sin. I know, when you are electing a man to 



492 SPEECHES of thomas corwix. 

make laws for you, you must elect one whose notions 
agree with yours ; but I do not know, that when you 
have a clerk at Washington, and the Whig party 
believe the penknife he uses ought to pay thirty per 
cent, ad valorem duty, and that poor clerk has not 
been able to see that distinctly, although he is a 
capital book-keeper and a faithful man, but in his 
soul and conscience, he thinks it would not be right 
to pay so much duty as that, that you should turn 
him out of office, and say that he is not fit for a book- 
keeper. It is not respectable. I know that, because 
I have seen it tried. No man can feel like a gentle- 
man, if God has made him one, and do that thing. 
If that man holds his tongue, we will not question 
him as to that; but if he is to go to Congress and 
make laws for us, to establish that duty on the pen- 
knife, then we will ask him about it. 

All of this we have done, and this has increased 
that party asperity, and induced men to take sides 
with the party in power, and, of course, the meanest 
men in the country will get the offices on that prin- 
ciple, the little executive offices and the little minis- 
terial offices. That is what we have all done. Let 
us quit it. Let us see if we can not quit it. If you 
want a man to represent your rej^ublic abroad, 
find a man who has some of the qualifications of 
a gentleman — I mean a gentleman of God's making, 
not a fellow in fine clothes, though of course he 
ought to be dressed decently when he goes coiirtmg. 
Let him be a man of respectability. You have 
enough of these men. Don't appoint a man who 



ON CUEEEXT POLITICAL ISSUES. 493 

shall be spoken of as a friend of mine told me one 
of our representatives was spoken of. My friend 
had been charge d'' affaires at Brussels, a great while — 
four years; while there, he became acquainted with 
a French diplomat, and that French diplomat had 
seen a man, at a foreign court, who represented our 
government as charge (f affaires. He was a v^ery 
stupid man; he did not speak any language very 
well. N^ow, said this French gentleman, "Why 
don't you send fine specimens, good-looking men, 
who speak some language?" "Oh!" said my friend, 
"don't they all speak some language?" "No," was 
the answer, "I met a gentleman at Copenhagen who 
speaks no language at all. He speaks some infernal 
2)atois, which they call OhioT Of course, your repre- 
sentative was treated with contempt. The French- 
man thought he was the best man we had. 

We should not be. very particular about his politics 
either; for our domestic politics have very little to 
do with our foreign missions. The man who would 
select a Judge of the Supreme Court or Circuit Court 
of the United States, to discharge the great duties of 
that station, because he was a Democrat or a Repub- 
lican, without reference to other qualif cations, his head 
ought to roll upon a block. Judicial qualifications 
have nothing to do with Republican ])olicy or Demo- 
cratic ]poliGy. Judges decide matters of law, not 
measures of policy. 

The opposition to the Administration on the other 
side of the river has been chiefly concerned in a dis- 
pute as to what shall be done with the slave pro|)erty 



494 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COEWII^. 

in the south. You have heard what friend Dennison 
has said. He says, it is the doctrine and resohite 
determination of the Republican party of Ohio, and 
he might have added, of all of what is called the free 
States of the Union, to exert the power which they 
hold belongs to them, under the Constitution of the 
United States, by Congressional action to prohibit 
slavery in any territory Avhere it does not already 
exist. My own impression is that that ought to be 
done. That is my belief about it. 

I am not so very particular about this, as a mere 
matter of doctrine, because I think that there will be 
much more important duties for us to perform when 
we get to Congress, than to dispute about this ab- 
stract proposition. Slavery exists, as 3^ou know, in 
certain portions of the United States. The only ter- 
ritories that can ever be subject to slavery, are those 
of Utah, New Mexico and Washington ; and into 
either of these, it would be madness to take slaves 
now. Kansas has settled the question for herself, 
after fighting a pretty hard battle, under this doctrine 
of " squatter sovereignty." 

But it is said, Congress has no power over this 
subject of slavery in the territories. It is said, you 
find, in the Constitution, the phrase, "popular sove- 
reignty," or "squatter sovereignty," or that the ideas 
represented by such language, is there, or fairly im- 
plied from language which is there. This is wdiat 
we do read in the Constitution touching the power 
of Congress over Territories. " Congress shall have 
power to make all needful rides and regulations re- 



ox CUERENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 495 

spec ting the Territory, or other property of the TTiiited 
States." iN'ow if the framers of the Constitution had 
intended, that the then JN'orth-western Territory and 
all Territories for all time to come should have the 
right, without any control of Congress, to enact and 
execute any law, which the inhabitants or squatters 
should please, would they not, after what I have 
recited, have gone on to declare, that "the inhab- 
itants of any territory should have power to make 
all needful rules and regidaUons for their internal and 
' municipal government? ' " It is very clear that they 
\vould have done so had they intended any such 
powder as wdiat is now called popular sovereignty 
should be exerted by the people of a Territory. But 
they inserted no clause to that effect, they left this 
power in Congress alone, and the history of our legis- 
lative, and judicial decisions and executive acts, all 
show for more than half a century, that such was the 
meaning and intent of the Constitution. 

The w^ords used in the Constitution wdiich I have 
read to you, have been criticised with a display of 
much philological learning. Words in use in the 
every-day talk and transactions of life are often used 
carelessly, and by different persons in very different 
senses ; w^ords that have application to peculiar 
sciences or arts have, when applied to such science 
or art, a w^ell-defined and fixed meaning. This is 
true of all words, in any language, which have refer- 
ence to the science of law. N^ow the w^ords ^' rules 
and regulations" used in the Constitution, have a fixed 
and well understood meaning. We should bear in 



496 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

mind that the men who framed and wrote the Consti- 
tution were not only wise and good men, having 
large acquaintance with the great princij^les of civil 
polity, but they were, many of them, learned men 
and very learned lawyers. When they made use 
of terms w^hich have been well defined in books 
which treat of law, they knew, and intended, that 
these w^ords or phrases should carry with them the 
same meaning which had been assigned them in the 
books from whence they derived them. I dare say, 
most of our advocates for popular sovereignty will 
allow that Gen. Hamilton, one of the most influ- 
ential members of the Convention, had read and 
studied Blackstone's Commentaries. Blackstone de- 
fines law to be a ^^rule^^ of action prescribed by 
the Supreme Power commending what is right, etc. 
When the Constitution ordained that Congress should 
have power to make all needful "rwZes" concerning 
the Territory — and it simply provided that Congress 
should have power to make all needful "/aiys" con- 
cerning the Territory — so the language imports, 
and so more than fifty years of practice prove, did 
"the Fathers" understand the words they had used. 
We must never lose sight of this historical argu- 
ment. On this subject it is worth all the philology 
of all the schools. There is a history pertaining to 
this question, as there is belonging to the Christian 
Church and to most of the great points of theology 
and divinity, arising out of the Bible, which is the 
constitution for that Church. ]S'ow, what do all 
preachers of the Christian religion do. when a dis- 



ox CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 497 

piite arises touching the meaning of a text. If the}^ 
can be satisfied by any explanation given by its 
author, either by words or acts, then the question is 
settled at once. By the plainest principle of com- 
mon sense, if the author of any writing whatever, 
declares the meaning of his own words, ihat is to 
be taken as the true meaning and intent of such 
author. If a question arises about the proper inter- 
pretation of a passage in the writings of Paul, Mat- 
thew, or John; if it can be shown that either of 
them declared what such text did mean, or, by his 
constant practice, and conduct, showed that the 
writer did understand it to mean this or that, then 
I presume, the most hypercritical disj)utant would be 
obliged to agree to such, as being the proper sense 
of the passage in disj^ute. 

Now the question I ask, in this, as in all other 
cases where the true intent and meaning of the 
Constitution is in question, is, what did "the Fa- 
thers" intend? Let their acts answer. I presume 
no one of the modern school of patriots will assert 
that the Fathers were rogues, and went straightway, 
after they made a Constitution, to break it. I could 
here tire your patience, exemplary as it is, by a long 
recital of their acts, showing that they understood 
the Constitution to give Congress full, and com- 
plete, and exclusive power, to legislate, in all cases, 
and on all subjects, for the Territories. Let a very 
few historical references on this point suffice, for 
the present. 

The Territory of Indiana, between the years 1803 
32 



498 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

and 1810, petitioned Congress, I think as often as 
three times, to enact a hxw which would authorize 
that Territory to hold slaves. Sometimes they asked 
it for a limited time, sometimes to have it in a 
modified form. Now what did Congress do with 
these petitions? Did they refuse to refer them to 
a committee, on the ground that Congress had no 
power to make any law (as now contended) for Ter- 
ritories? No such thing. They referred all these 
petitions to committees, from time to time, as they 
were presented. Wliat did the committees do in 
the premises ? Did they report, that Congress had 
no power over the subject, and ask to be dismissed 
and discharged from its further consideration ? JN'ot 
at all. On the contrary, they examined the peti- 
tions, they deliberated, they reflected ; they consid- 
ered the territory and its people as their territory, 
and their proper constituents. They acted as guard- 
ians of Indiana Territory, as having been so consti- 
tuted by the Constitution, which had imposed this 
duty upon Congress, from which duty they could 
not release themselves. In one instance, I believe, 
one committee reported favorably to the prayer for 
slavery, but that report was never sanctioned by the 
vote of Congress, nor was it rejected. It lay on the 
table, and was not acted upon by Congress at all. 
In another instance, the justly celebrated John Ran- 
dolph, of Roanoke, was chairman of the committee 
to whom one of these petitions was referred. He 
was then a Jeffersonian Republican. He was not 
one to assume power not granted by the Constitu- 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 499 

tion. Xor was he likely to be ignorant of any of 
those arguments, now-a-days quite common, in i^ivor 
of the advantages of slave labor. He was a Vir- 
ginian, a slaveholder, and beyond any cavil or doubt, 
he was "of the first families." He, I suppose, had 
not learned yet what his successors in Virginia, 
perhaps of the first, perhaps of the second families, 
have discovered, that is, that hij virtue of the Con- 
stitution, slavery was in Indiana all the time. TsTei- 
ther did the stupid people of Indiana, who begged 
Congress for slavery, know this great secret. Had 
some modern lawyer but been "then and there" to 
pronounce "the magic word," "the response of the 
oracle" as given now, "over all the Territories the 
Constitution carries and sanctifies slavery, ' suo pro- 
prio^igore^ " — had Randolph and Cpesar A. Rodney 
"but known this much," what labor, what painful 
thought and anxious care would have been sj^ared 
to them ! x\las for "the Fathers," they did not know 
what their own Constitution meant — they did not 
understand the work of their own hands ; they did 
not, it seems, comprehend the import of their own 
thoughts, and, more to be deplored than even this, 
the "old fogies" of Indiana had not heard of "popu- 
lar sovereignty," or if they, by any lucky chance, had 
heard these pregnant and magic words, they surely 
did not apprehend their meaning. But let us be 
grave, for the subject certainly is one of the gravest 
importance. You see, my fellow-citizens, that, in the 
early infancy of our Constitutional history, all men, 
all Congresses, clearly asserted the right of CongTess 



500 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

to prohibit slavery in territories. Randolph reported 
against the prayer for slavery, and said, in his reports, 
in substance, that the Territory would find ample 
compensation for the temporary want of labor, in 
more rapid emigration, and in being finally free 
from the evil influences of slavery ; and so the com- 
mittee and Congress, in this way, asserted their 
power to make laws for Indiana Territory, and refused 
to permit slavery there. Now we have found out 
what the Fathers did under the Constitution which 
the Fathers made, and so we have reached the main 
fact, that is, they said, by their acts, "When we 
made the Constitution, we intended to give, and did 
give. Congress power to enact laws for territories." 
But ten years i^ass away, and the year 1820 comes, 
freighted with its cares, its wise men and their 
deeds — very weak men these of 1820, according 
to our modern standard ; very foolish deeds theirs, 
according to the judgment of unshaven, unbearded 
boys of 1859. But what was the year of grace 1820 ? 
We old gentlemen who were of that day, and by 
special providence have been permitted to see the 
great light of this, can recall many of the events, 
aspects and feelings of 1820, with pleasure to our- 
selves, and not, we hope, without profit, as furnish- 
ing a small contingent of that now much despised 
article, experience, once deemed the true, and un- 
failing school of wisdom. 

Our Republic, from its first emergence into the 
dignity of independent nationality, was never more 
truly national, or, if you please American, than in 



ON CUERENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 501 

this year 1820. We had then but recently come out 
of tlie war of 1812, with Great Britain. At the 
close of that war, "political parties" were all, all 
Jeacl — one only remained, and that was an United 
American party. We were united in heart, in feel- 
ing, in principle, and in policy. Mr. Monroe was 
President at this time. He was singularly free from 
party asperity in feeling, and not at all troubled with 
hobbies or crotchets. Mr. Madison's administration, 
which preceded, had been characterized by a happy 
admixture of the best of the principles and policy of 
both of the Federal and Republican parties, and Mr. 
Monroe walked in his footsteps. The cabinet of 
Mr. Monroe was composed of men, each of whom 
might be truly said to be "a man." John Quincy 
Adams was Secretary of State; William H. Craw- 
ford, Secretary of the Treasury; John C. Calhoun, 
Secretary of War; Samuel L. Southard, Secretary 
of the Navy; William Wirt, Attorney-General. 
John McLean was Post-Master General, but this 
officer was not then a member of the cabinet. Each 
one and all of these eminent men may be said to have 
been great and good men. Their history justifies 
me in this opinion. While these men composed the 
Executive department of the government. Congress 
admitted Missouri into the Union. The northern 
boundary of Missouri was the line of latitude 36° 30' ; 
n(M'th of this line there were no white inhabitants; 
all north of it was territory, the same now known 
as Kansas and Nebraska. Missouri was admitted 
with slavery, for good reasons, which I will show you 



502 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

presently. But at the same time (1821) the then 
Congress enacted a law which declared, that all 
the territory comprehended in the Louisiana purchase 
lying north of latitude 36° 30' should be forever /f6<? 
territory. By this law slavery was forever forbidden 
in all the territory now organized as Kansas and 
Nebraska Territories, The question was then settled 
by Congress again, as we now contend it should have 
been, and is still, "that Congress had the ^^ower to 
prohibit slavery in Territories." So far, we find the 
legislative department of the Government agreeing, 
by an unbroken series of decisions, that this power 
did exist, and, what we should never forget, " that it 
was also expedient, and for the public good, to pro- 
hibit slavery in the Territories, w^herever it did not 
exist before such prohibition." 

Now for the executive department. We have seen 
that Mr, Monroe was president at this time, and we 
have already heard who, and what sort of men com- 
posed his cabinet. We now know, that this very 
question was submitted for decision to that cabinet, 
and that every member of it, including Mr, Monroe, 
agreed that Congress had power, under, and by 
virtue of the Constitution, to enact that law — that is, 
they decided that Congress had the power to prohibit 
slavery in Territories, and Mr. Monroe accordingly 
approved and signed that bill. Now, I ask, where 
then w^as the Constitution, with slavery under its 
arm in all territories, as they now say, bearing its 
blessed freight abroad, '■^ suo proprioyigoref^ Where 
was "popular sovereignty" then? Where was the 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 503 

watchful eye of Monroe, the appointed keeper of the 
Constitution? Where was the profound learning of 
Adams ? where the calm wisdom and rigid con- 
struction of Crawford? Where slept the keen 
sagacity and analytic powers of Calhoun? where 
the law learning, and deliberative mind of Southard? 
and above all, what fatal opiate had drugged the all- 
accomplished mind of Wirt into lethean forgetfulness? 
My countrymen, my friends, can you believe that 
President Pierce and his cabinet, and a few such 
gentlemen as we all know, in Congress, in the ^''ear 
of grace, 1854, knew more of the true meaning of 
the blessed Constitution of this country, than the 
men of 1803, of 1804, of 1810, or those whom I 
have named, in 1820 and in 1821 ? It is not neces- 
sary that I should draw the parallel, or compare, or 
contrast the intellect or the patriotism of these two 
classes of men. The men of 1821 enacted the pro- 
hibition of slavery in the territory north of 36° 30'. 
The men of 1854 repealed that law. Compare the 
two; let every man be his own Plutarch, I can not 
now speak their lives. 

Let us now j)ass over the time between 1821 and 
1848. In the latter year, Oregon Territory was or- 
ganized. Pause here a moment and consider how 
this became necessary. The anxious, busy, sleep- 
less, hardy Yankee had been whaling in the Pacific. 
He had read of Grey and Kendricks' wanderings in 
that sea, of their sailing up the Columbia river. He 
had, perhaps, anchored at the mouth of that river 
with his "home returning freight " of oil. He had. 



504 SPEECHES OF THOMAS COKWIN. 

it may be, mixed a can of switchel there and looked 
out upon the kind. He comes home, and forthwith 
the kigger in Maine prepares to migrate. The man 
in Connecticut, and in Massachusetts, quits his cotton- 
mills, his cutleries, his comb-factories, and lo! the 
next tidings you hear of Jonathan, he is down on 
the Pacific, with "shop up and shingle out" ready for 
business. From that moment, no whale nor salmon 
shall have a "christian burial" west of the Stony 
Mountains. Minks, seals, otters, and all fur-bear- 
ing creatures, ye are hats and caps and no "living- 
thing," from thenceforth forevermore. It is clear 
that such a peoj^le should be '''organized," and so it 
was done in the year 1848. In that bill, slavery in 
Oregon territory was prohibited, and Mr. Polk, then 
president, "approved" and signed it. In the inter- 
mediate time between 1821 and 1848, very many acts 
of Congress, enacting, or recognizing the same prin- 
ciple (the power of Congress to make laws for Terri- 
tories ) wore passed, signed and approved. But still 
further, in all the organic laws made for all territo- 
ries, I think (perhaps there may be an exception or 
two) Avhere Congress authorize a territorial legisla- 
ture to enact laws, they go on to provide in substance 
that all laws enacted by such legislatures shall be 
reported to Congress, and if Congress shall dis- 
approve them, ihey shall be null and void. This you 
will find in the acts of 1850, organizing Utah and 
Xew Mexico. The same provision is in the organic 
law of Washington territory, passed in 1852. Does 
not that provision assert the omnipotent legislative 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 505 

power of Congress over territories, in total forgetful- 
ness of popular sovereignty, or even constitutions, 
^^suo p'02)rio'^igore^^ extending slavery. All such 
laws have been enacted by Congresses of every hue 
of politics, various as these shades have been, and 
approved by Presidents of all jDarties. Thus we 
have the legislative and executive departments from 
the adoption of the United States Constitution up to 
1852, a jDeriod of over sixty years, affirming the 
Republican doctrine held by us, my Republican 
brethren, this 19th day of July, 1859. Now we see 
where the "Fathers'" foot-prints are, the road is 
plain, well paved, and straight. The milestones 
are red with revolutionary blood. We can not be 
lost in it. With God's blessing, and I humbly trust 
with his approval, we will aver, this day, that neither 
Presidents nor President-makers, nor principalities 
nor powers, shall stop us in our march onward in 
that road. 

My fellow-citizens, I invoke your patience while 
we look for a moment, into the judicial department. 
If we can find our Republican principles approved 
there, then authority, example, j^i'ecedent, can go no 
further. 

In the year 1828, the case of " The American In- 
surance Co., and others, against David Carter," came 
before the Supreme Court of the United States — 
John Marshall being then Chief Justice. This case 
will be found reported in 1^^ Peters' Reports^ page 
511. This question of the power of Congress over 
Territories is spoken of by Justice Marshall, in that 



506 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

case, in these terms. I will read his words — for the 
words of such a man should never be repeated but 
with care and reverence. Speaking of the treaty by 
which we acquired Florida from Spain, he says: ''''The 
treaty is the law of the land, and admits the inhabitants 
of Florida to the enjoyment of the lyrivileges, rights and 
immunities of citizens of the United States. It is unne- 
cessary to inquire whether this is not their condition inde- 
pendent of stipulation. They do not, however, participate 
in political power ; they do not share in the Grovernment 
till Florida sliall become a State. ^^ Now mark what 
follows : "//I the meantime, Florida continues to be a ter- 
ritory of the United States, governed by virtue of that 
clause in the Constitution which empowers Congress to 
make all needful rules and regulations respecting the ter- 
ritory or other property belonging to the United State^s. 
Perhaps the power of governing the territories belonging 
to the United States, ivhich has not by becoming a State 
acquired the means of self-government, may result neces- 
sarily from the facts that it is not within the jurisdiction 
of any particular State, and is within the power and 
jurisdiction of the United States. The right to govern 
may be the inevitable consequence of the right to acquire 
territory. Whatever may be the source whence the ]}ower 
is derived, the possession of it is unquestioned.''^ Now, 
whose opinions shall weigh against those of John 
Marshall, and I believe every judge on the bench 
then agreed with him ? If it has pleased God ever to 
create a man with an intellect incapable of deceiving 
itself or being deceived by others, if Divine Wisdom 
ever endowed a human soul with the jjower of find- 



ON CUERENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 507 

ing his way to truth safely and certainly, through 
all the mists of prejudice and all the artfully-con- 
trived mazes of sophistry, such a mind was given 
to Chief Justice Marshall. You have heard his 
opinions ; they are the doctrines on this subject of our 
Republican party this day. The executive, legis- 
lative and judicial wisdom, all accordant for sixty 
years, assure us of our fciith, and call on us to perse- 
vere in our practice. But what shall I sa}'' of the 
Dred Scott decision ? Nothing. The question I am 
considering was not before the Court in that case, 
and therefore could not have been decided ;''o^/^er 
^ dicta f there may be;(liscussions relating to the subject; 
/ but no judicial, no authoritative decision on this ques- 
tion was possible in that case. 

I have spoken of the Act organizing Utah and 
N'ew Mexico, passed in 1850. You all remember 
the long and anxious debate which preceded the 
passage of that law; the fearful forebodings of some, 
the threats of dissolution of the Union by others — 
it was indeed a sad spectacle, a dark day. It came 
upon us by our conquest of Mexico. The treaty 
which terminated the Mexican war, gave us IN'ew 
Mexico and California. The treaty, I say, gave us, 
these provinces, but I should have said, it gave them 
up after we, by stro)igh.Sind, had wrenched them from 
weak Mexico. The treaty was the deed of convey- 
ance, the right, if right it may be called, was founded 
in the bloody victories of Buena Vista, Cerro Gordo, 
Chepultepec, and Molino del Rey. The evidences of 
our title, are the graves of many thousands of our 



508 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

noble and heroic children. There was one bearing a 
humble part in your national councils then, who 
desired to put an end to that Mexican war before you 
had obtained these provinces. I shall not name that 
man. He ventured to prophesy that it would come 
to no good end ; that when you had obtained this ter- 
ritory, whether by conquest or purchase, this very 
question of the extension of slavery into it would 
arise ; that it would be a firebrand in our maga- 
zine ; it would excite a spirit of discord, which in its 
wild and ungovernable fury might rend the family 
ties of the Union, and scatter us in disordered frag- 
ments away, far and forever away, from the good old 
family home builded for us by our fathers, in which 
we had so long and so happily dwelt. For this that 
man was burned in effigy often, but yet not burned 
up. This prediction was not very far from its fulfill- 
ment in 1850, if all the sinister aspects of that day 
maybe trusted as giving "signs of the times." It 
w^as, perhaps, proper that we should be visited with 
troubles in managing such conquests. Retribution is 
with the Grod of the nations. May we not forget 
where that power is lodged by a certain Constitution 
enacted before time began, to be in full force through- 
out all eternity to come. 

I ask you, my fellow-citizens, is there ever to be 
an end of this question ? What does the Judge tell 
you when he decides a case? He tells you, in the 
language of the law, that "it is expedient for the 
country that there should be an end to the ques- 
tion." Your law titles depend upon that. Would 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 509 

you not consider it strange, if, twenty years after, 
another court should come and decide the contrary ? 
A sensible court would say, this has been decided 
twenty years ago, argued legally, and " it is expedi- 
ent for the country that there should be an end to 
the question." If you want to have a written con- 
stitution that you can rely on at all, you must have 
an interpretation put upon the words, and let it read 
that way until the people choose to change it by 
altering the words, otherwise a written constitution 
will be made to read this thing one year, and another 
thing another year. 

Now I wish to read, for the special benefit of weak 
brethren, a few words from a couj)le of the apostles 
of modern Democracy. On the 4th day of March, 
1850, John C Calhoun (the Compromise Bill of Mr. 
Clay being then under discussion in the Senate) 
spoke as follows : "In claiming the right for the 
inhabitants, instead of Congress, to legislate for the 
territories in the executive proviso, it assumes that 
the sovereignty over the Territories is vested in the 
former, or to express it in the language used in a 
resolution offered by one of the Senators from Texas 
(Gren. Houston) , they have the same inherent right 
of self-government as the people of the States. This 
assumption is utterly unfoumled, mwonstitutional, and 
contrary to the entire ])ractice of the Government from 
its commencement to the i^resent timeT ]Mr. Calhoun 
then goes on with his comments upon the subject, 
and says, " Nor is it less clear that the j^ower of legis- 
lating over the acquired territory is vested in Congress, 



510 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

and not, as is assumed, in the inhabitants of the Terri- 
tories r Thus far Mr. Calhoun in 1850. 

On the 2cl day of June, 1850, this same subject 
being still under discussion, Mr. Douglas thus de- 
livers himself of his opinions. Let it not be forgotten 
that Mr. D. must have reflected much and long on 
this very subject, as he had long served as chairman 
of the committee on Territories. I read from his 
reported speech, doubtless carefully revised by him- 
self: "^«/, sir, I do not hold the doctrine, that to 
exclude any species of property by law, from any 
territory, is a violation of any right to j^i'operty. 
Do you not exclude banks from most of the Terri- 
tories ? Do you not exclude whisky from being in- 
troduced into large portions of the territory of the 
United States ? Do you not exclude gambling-tables, 
which are properly recognized as such, in the States 
where they are tolerated? And, has any one con- 
tended that the exclusion of ardent spirits was a 
violation of any Constitutional j)rivilege or right? 
and yet it is the case in a large portion of the ter- 
ritory of the United States ; but there is no outcry 
against that, because it is the prohibition of a specific 
kind of property, and not a prohibition against any 
section of the Union. Why, sir, our laws now pre- 
^'ent a tavern-keeper from going into some of the Ter- 
ritories of the United States, and taking a bar with 
him, and using and selling spirits there. The law also 
prohibits certain other descriptions of business from 
being carried on in the Territories. I am not, there- 
fore, prepared to say that, under the Constitution we have 



ox CURRENT ROLITICAL ISSUES. 511 

not the power to pass laws excluding negro slaves from 
Territories. It involves the same jJrincipleJ^ — (Vol. 21 
Cong. Globe, p. 1,115.) 

'Now what are we to conclude from this array of 
the history of this question, and the uniform opinions 
of the greatest, the wisest, and all men down to the 
least? Beginning from the first establishment of 
our present constitutional government, and ending in 
1850, or perhaps more properly in 1852, when Wash- 
ington Territor}'^ was organized, reserving ultimate 
legislative power over that territory in Congress ? I 
ask my brother Democrats, whether of the Buchanan 
or Douglas church, shall we not adhere to the 
opinions of the "fathers?" Have we the enormous 
egotism to suppose that we, we of this latter day, 
have better knowledge of the meaning of our political 
gospels than the fathers who wrote them? If you 
think and believe this folly, why then you are past 
praying for, and I am done with you. 

We have now settled our constitutional rights as 
to the extent and mode in which the Republicans 
propose to prevent the further extension of slavery. 
I wish here to say, that I think this prohibitory 
power should be exerted as to all territory now ours, 
and all that shall become ours wherever slavery is 
not established when such territory is acquired, with 
this qualification, that it must be such climate as a 
white man, and the white race generally, can live and 
work in. I think it is a question not yet settled 
whether the white race, our white race, can work 
and live in health, in very hot latitudes. 



brJ SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

Let us look for a moment into our duties under 
the Constitution toward the slaveholding States. 
Much excitement has existed in Ohio and elsewhere 
about the "Fugitive Slave Bill" — so it is familiarly 
called. This subject has not yet been fairly and dis- 
passionately presented to the jyeojile. It may have 
been so presented to courtSj and in courts, but not, 
as I believe, in our popular meetings. The act of 
1850 has many objectionable provisions which are 
easily misunderstood, and which are altogether use- 
less and of no avail in the practical o^^eration of the 
law, I should not have voted for that law had I 
been in the Senate when it passed. I prefer the old 
law of 1793; it is free from most of the follies of the 
present law, and it is just as easy to reclaim a 
fugitive under the first as under the law of 1850. I 
understand that some in Ohio, and it may be some 
on the Kentucky side, have supposed that any man 
from Kentucky who comes here in pursuit of a 
fugitive, a runaway negro, can command a citizen 
of Ohio to aid him in catching him. This is said to 
be the opinion in Kentucky, I should like to know 
if this be so. My friend, Mr, Moore, now on the 
rostrum, recently, I am happy to inform you, elected 
to Congress from the district in Kentucky opposite 
to us, can say whether this be so. 

[Here Mr. Moore observed, '-That is so."] 

Well, that may be your construction, but you, and 
all in Ohio, who have (as I believe), to render this 
law odious, maintained this construction, are all mis- 



ox CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 513 

taken. The law requires no such thing; it could not 
compel us here to do so, were a thousand laws made 
for that purpose. I know the act of 1850 requires 
all citizens to aid the master or his agent, or the 
officer having j^rocess to arrest a fugitive, when such 
master, his agent, or the officer, is resisted by a rnoh or 
any force which can not he repelled without such aid. 

[Mr. Moore here remarked, '* We say as you do, if we are 
resisted then you must aid us."] 

Exactly so, such is the law. Now this is precisely 
what is enjoined by the laws of Ohio, and I suppose 
all the States, when the execution of the laws is 
forcibly resisted. In such case, we do not aid in re- 
claiming a slave, but we aid in suppressing a mob, 
we aid in putting down forcible resistance to law, to 
our law, for all laws of the United States are the 
laws made by the representatives of all the people 
of the United States. But some of our people, some 
who act with us, very few I think, say this law is not 
a binding law, because it is contrary to the Constitu- 
tion, and above all, they say it is opposed to the 
"natural inherent rights of man." JSTow, I have to 
say as to the first of these objections, the courts both 
state and federal have decided that this law is not 
contrary to the United States Constitution, and that 
Congress had power to enact that law. The Supreme 
Court of Ohio has very recently, on solemn argument, 
so decided. This is enough for me and all law- 
abiding men. "We must obey and not resist that 
law. If we do not think it a good law, why go to 
33 



514 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN. 

the ballot-box, elect men who will alter or repeal it. 
The cartridge-box is not to be resorted to in this 
country in such matters ; that other more harmless 
box, the ballot-box, is our resort in all such cases. 
If the majority is against us, why we must submit. 
There can be no government possible, if any and 
every individual may determine for himself, what 
law he will obey, and what he will not obey. As to 
the inherent right of a slave to run away from his 
master, why this inherent right ceases, if the Con- 
stitution has said his master may follow him and 
reclaim him. I think, in such a case, the master's 
constitutional rights will be likely to vanquish the 
slave's "inherent" right. We can have no inherent 
rights in our Government which conflict with rights 
established by our organic law, else in the case put 
by me now, we must be driven to declare the United 
States Constitution itself to be unconstitutional. This 
Avould be the grossest nonsense. But what says the 
Constitution? In the fourth article and the last par- 
agraph in section two, you can read these words: 
"No person held to service or labor in one State, 
under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall 
in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be 
discharged from such service or labor, hut shall he 
delivered up, on claim of the party to ivhom such service 
or labor may he due^ Now you see, my Rej^ublican 
friends, that we are required by this clause of that 
sacred instrument not to help away a fugitive or 
resist his capture, but it requires of us that he '•''shall 
he delivered up on claim of the party to whom his service 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 515 

or labor may he dm'' This, in plain words, means 
that a slave who runs away from Kentucky, shall 
be by us delivered to his master when he, the 
master, or his agent, comes here after him. Now 
you, the Republican party claim that your Congress 
may prohibit slavery in Territories. How came you 
by such right? Only by virtue of this very United 
States Constitution can you claim to do this. Is it 
not fair, then, that the right of your southern brother 
to reclaim his runaway slave, given to him in this 
same Constitution, should be conceded to him. Will 
you take so much of the Constitution as you like 
to-day, and abrogate what you don't like? Yet this 
is just the thing, this is the absurdity which some 
few people, well-meaning men, perhaps, seem to 
require of us. I proclaim here to-day to all whom 
it may concern, that such is not the doctrine of the 
Republican party of Ohio. If this were its doctrine 
it would dwindle into a contemptible minority, m 
one day after it should be made known. 

There is another question sometimes mooted in 
and out of Congress, dividing, it is said, the ]N"orth 
and the South : Shall any more slave States be 
admitted into the Union ? Now I wish to answer this 
question for myself If you will conquer or purchase 
any state, province or territory, wherein slavery i-s aji 
established institution, and agree, as you did in the' 
Louisiana treaty, to admit such province, island, or- 
Territory into the Union, with such rights as belong, 
to the original States, then I say you must admit 
them with their slavery. Such treaty is the supreme' 



516 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIX. 

law of the land. It is so declared by the Constitu- 
tion. To that supreme law you must submit, in the 
case I have supposed. Let me here read an extract 
from a speech of John Quincy Adams, in Con- 
gress, on the admission of Arkansas into the Union, 
in 1836: 

" Mr. Chairman: — I can not, consistently with my sense of my 
obligations as a citizen of the United States, and bound by oath 
to support their Constitution, I can not object to the admission 
of Arkansas into the Union as a slave State, as Louisiana, and 
Mississippi, and Alabama, and Missouri have been admitted by 
virtue of that article in the treaty for the acquisition of Louisiana, 
which secures to the inhabitants of the ceded territories, all the 
rights, privileges, and immunities of the original citizens of the 
United States, and stipulates for their admission, conformably to 
that principle, into the Union. Louisiana was purchased as a 
country wherein slavery was the established law of the land. As 
Congress have not power in time of peace to abolish slavery in the 
original States of the Union, they are equally destitute of the 
power in those parts of the territory ceded by France to the 
United States, by the name of Louisiana, where slavery existed 
at the time of the acquisition. Slavery is in this Union the sub- 
ject of internal legislation in the States, and in peace is cogni- 
zable by Congress, only as it is tacitly tolerated and protected 
where it exists by the Constitution of the United States, and as 
it mingles in their intercourse with other nations. Arkansas 
therefore comes, and has the right to come, into the Union with 
her slaves, and with her slave laws. It is written in the bond, 
and, however I may lament that it ever was so written, I must 
faithfully perform iffe obligations." 

Mr. Adams was not the man to favor slavery, but 
he was the man to follow, with fearless intrepidity, 
the dictates of truth, justice and honor. He Avell 



ON CURRENT POLITICAL ISSUES. 517 

understood, if any man ever did, the powers of the 
States and of the General Grovernment, and he woiikl 
not flinch from the great paramount duty of an 
American statesman, in yielding to each that which 
belonged to each. My opinion is, and always was, 
what he has so happily expressed in the extract 
which I have read. Let us suppose that you pur- 
chase the Island of Cuba, which by-the-way you will 
not do soon — Cuba has a well and long-established 
institution called Slavery — you will not, probably (as 
you did not in the case of California and JN'ew Mex- 
ico), ask the consent of the people of Cuba to come 
into the Union or under your government in any 
form. What is the gToat and universally accepted 
dogma on which all your institutions rest ? It is thus 
expressed, "all rightful power of government is de- 
rived from, the consent of the people to be governed."" 
When you buy from the king or queen of Spain the 
right to govern the Island and people of Cuba, will yc>u 
provide that the purchase money shall not be paid 
until the consent of the people to the transfer shall be 
given by a vote of all the white male inhabitants of 
the Island? If you will, then you will never get Cuba, 
unless you take her with slavery. The people will 
not consent to come under your yoke unless you take 
slavery, as an established law, also. If you provide 
for their admission into the Union with equal rights 
with the other States, then your former practice, 
and Mr. Adam's opinion, and mine, and that of every 
other man who regards the sanctity of treaties, will 
settle the question. 



518 SPEECHES OF THOMAS CORWIN". 

My friends, I must conclude. I have exhausted 
m\ strength, and am sure I have overtaxed your 
patience. One word of advice at parting. If you 
wish to silence, for our time, and for a long time, this 
disturbing and dangerous question of slavery, you 
have nothing to do but resolve that you will acquire 
no more territory for the next twenty years. That 
which you now have will never raise the question ; it 
is that which you expect to get, which gives the ques- 
tion all its real importance. You already have about 
one-tenth part of the globe, within your territorial 
limits. Be content with that — cultivate well what 
you have ; raise up men, good men, honest men ; 
improve the animal man, and be not too careful to 
extend your power. This done, and the South and 
the North, and the East and the West will rush into 
each others' arms, and cling closer to each other on 
account of the former partial estrangement. Then 
we shall be indeed citizens, /e/ta-citizens of one coun- 
try, and that country free, powerful, and happy — all, 
all uniting in thankfulness to God for the happy 
times in which we live, the great country we live in, 
and the glorious institutions we live under. God 
bless you all, my friends. I have given you much 
good advice to-day, much of which I fear some will 
not follow. I charge you nothing for it, but believe 
me, and try it. I am sure if you will, it shall profit 
you quite as much as counsel for which I dare say 
some of you have often paid what you may have 
thought was a very large fee. 



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